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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 









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PRINCESS'S PALACE, PETROPOLIS 



TROPICAL AMERICA 



BY 



ISAAC N. FORD 



ILLUSTRATED 



NEW YORK C^ y ^ f 

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
1893 



V"- 



i- 



COPYRIGHT, 1893, BY 
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS. 



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TO DONALD NICHOLSON 

My Dear Sir .- 

I wish to connect this volume with your na^ne, not merely because 
the journeys in Tropical America of which it bears record were 
undertaken with your encouragement and co-operation, but also 
because twenty years of intimate acquaintance during working 
hours have unerringly revealed the strottg fibre of your char- 
acter and the graces of your friendship. It is a pleasure to 
make public acknowledgitient of the fine qualities of heart and 
mind which all your associates have recognized. Permit ine, 
my dear sir, to remain., with high personal regard, most faith- 
fully yours, 

ISAAC N. FORD 



PREFACE 

In making the circuit of Tropical America described 
in these pages I was received with uniform kindness 
by the representatives of the United States Government 
in nearly all the capitals and ports which I visited. It 
is at once a duty and a pleasure to acknowledge their 
hospitality and aid, while it would be manifestly im- 
proper to hold them responsible in any degree for the 
opinions expressed in this volume. By introducing me 
to well-informed men and by many other courtesies 
they greatly facilitated my investigation of political 
and commercial conditions. I may at least express 
gratefully my pressing obligations to Consul Baker, of 
Buenos Ayres; to the American Ministers in Lima, 
Caracas, and Mexico; to Consul-General Adamson in 
Panama; and to Consul-General Williams in Havana. 
I have also to thank Mr. Charles R. Flint and Mr. 
Irving King of New York for their courtesy in providing 
photographs for four of the illustrations. 

Returning to Cuba while this volume is in press, I 
find overwhelming evidence of the successful operation 
of the policy of commercial union with the United 
States and of the development of annexation sentiment. 
I am well pleased, however, to leave the chapter on 
" The Last Spanish Stronghold " as it was written. If 
it be a more conservative view of the Cuban question 
than the facts now seem to justify, I shall not be ex- 

v 



VI PREFACE 

posed to criticism for exaggerating the importance of 
the annexation movement. 

I have sought to exercise sobriety of judgment in 
commenting upon recent revolutionary movements in 
Brazil, the Plate countries, and Chili, and also in de- 
scribing the travesties on republican government enacted 
in Colombia and Venezuela. Administrative corruption 
and military usurpation are the vices of Spanish-Ameri- 
can civilization ; but it has also great virtues — notably 
flexibility in dealing with inferior races, a genuine love 
of country, and energy in the development of industrial 
resources. There is vastly more to admire than there 
is to censure in the Southern half of our Continent. 

I. N. F. 

Havana, December 7, 1892. 



CONTENTS 



I. A Voyage to Rio 

PAGE 

Short Notice for a Long Journey — A Cargo of Jonahs — St. 
Thomas as a Naval Station — Lights and Shadows of West 
Indian History — Glimpses of Martinique and Barbadoes — 
Brazilian Coast Towns — Evolution of Native Costurnes — 
Characteristics of Rio de Janeiro 1 

n. Rio's Three Glorious Days 

Mutiny of the Battalions — General Deodoro's Bravado — The Re- 
public proclaimed — The Emperor's Surrender — An Orleans 
Bargain — General Causes of Disaffection with the Empire — 
The Revolution a Lottery 26 

in. Petropolis without an Emperor 

Journey to the Brazilian Catskills — Christmas in a Lovely Valley 
— A Palace Closed and Sealed — A Shabby-Genteel Court — 
Departure of the Lnperial Exiles — Clericalism at Court — 
The Empress's Death 44 

rV. A New Era in Brazil 

American Precedents followed — An Enlightened Scheme of Con- 
stitutional Law — Deodoro's Dictatorship and Downfall — 
Disestablishment of the Church — Home Rule — Financial Dis- 
orders — A Struggle from Darkness to Light 58 

V. Entrance of the Plate 

How a Commercial Empire has been Won — Humble Pie for an 
American — European Maritime Enterprise — Montevideo and 

its Suburbs — Night Passage to Buenos Ayres 74 

vii 



VIU CONTENTS 

VI. Across the Argentine 

PAGE 

New Harbor of Buenos Ayres — Chicago Latitude South — La 
Plata and its Port — Rapid Progi-ess of Rosario — Agricultural 
Colonies — Mediaeval Cordova — Over the Pampas to Mendoza 

— The Argentine's Best Investment — An Orgy of Currency 
Inflation and Speculation — Political Cabals and Jobbery — 
The Revolution of July, 1890 — Future of the Argentine 87 

VU. The Heart of the Andes 

A Picturesque but Mendacious Guide — Mule Ride through Uspal- 
lata — An Attack of Sorroche — First Glimpse of the Highest 
Cordilleras — Ascent of the Cumbre — Adventures with a 
Drunken Guide 125 

VIII. Chili and its Civil War 

Signs of Patriotism and Thrift — A Homogeneous Population — 
Santiago and Valparaiso — Development of European Trade — 
The Constitutional Conflict — The Civil War — Downfall of 
Balmaceda 143 

IX. The Rainless Coast 

A Stupendous Natural Phenomenon — The Chilian Seaboard — 
Antof agasta and Iquique — Nitrate Beds — The Flag at Arica 

— The Peruvian Coast — Repudiation of Paper Money — 
Down the Andes in a Hand-Car — Mr. Meigg's Engineering 
Feats — An Irrational National Policy — A Master-Stroke of 
Finance and Diplomacy 165 

X. Lima in Carnival Week 

A Saturnalia of Practical Joking — Beauty of the Women — A 
Shabby but Delightful City — Past and Present in the Rimac 
Valley — Miraflores and ChoriUos 194 

XT. Guayaquil and the Isthmus 

Voyage from Callao to Panama — Ecuador's Busy Port — The 
Isthmus Capital — Water after Cognac and Champagne — Con- 
flicting views of the French Canal — Extension of the Conces- 
sions — Probable Action of the Colombian Government 209 



CONTENTS IX 

XII. Cartagena and Caracas 

PAQB 

The Chief Fortress of the Spanish Main — Home of President 
Nunez — The Colombian Travesty of Republican Government 

— Venezuelan Coast Towns — American Commercial Enter- 
prise — Birthplace of Bolivar — Revolt against Guzman Blanco 

— A Presidential Inauguration at Car&cas 224 

Xni. Jamaica and the Bahamas 

Port Royal as a Naval Station — Kingston and Rural Jamaica — 
The West-Indian Exhibition — A Canadian Elirtation with 
Poor Relations — Reciprocity with American Commercial De- 
pendencies- — A Working Governor — Bahama Hemp and Cane 
Sugar — Industrial Condition of the British West Indies — San 
Salvador . . , 242 

XIV. The Last Spanish Stronghold 

Along the Cuban Coast — Expedients for Harassing American 
Shipping — Vanity Fair in Cienfuegos — Aspects of the Cuban 
Capital — Signs of Exhaustion in Matanzas — American Oppor- 
tunities and Responsibilities — The Last Market for Cane 
Sugar — Unreciprocal Protection Ruinous to Cuba — Havana 
Helpless but Washington Powerful — Annexation and Com- 
mercial Union 260 

XV. A Circuit of Mexican Towns 

Ruined Races and Prosperous Industries of Yucatan — New Har- 
bor Works at Tampico — Vera Cruz in White Cerements — 
Old-Time Scenes in Orizaba — Puebla and Cholula — The 
most Prosaic Capital of Spanish America — Toluca and Morelia 

— Lake Patzcuaro and Tzintzuntzan — An Indian Art-Idol in 
a Ruined Church — Contrast between Aguas Calientes and 
San Luis Potosi — Monterey in a Transition Stage 291 

XVI. Future of Mexico. 

The Agricultural Industries — The Cactus Procession — Conser- 
vatism and Labor — Blunders of American Diplomacy and 
Tariff-Making — Commercial Union between Silver-Producing 
Countries — Signs of Progress — A New Order of Intellectual 
Independence .... 323 



X CONTENTS 

XVn. The Mosquito Reservation 

PAGE 

A Region of Anomalies — Moravian Missions in Bluefields — 
The Mosquito Crown Captured by a Yankee — Negro Rule and 
Nicaraguan Ambition — Voyage with a Carib Pilot — The 
Coral Cays and Monkey Point — A Dead Calm in the Carib- 
bean — A Diet of Young Cocoanuts 341 

XVIII. Up the San Juan 

Contrast between Panama and Greytown — The Nicaragua Canal 

— Passage of the Colorado Bar — The Central American Forest 

— The Rival Interoceanic Waterways — Lake Nicaragua — 
Walker's Exploits — American Control over an Interoceanic 
Canal 358 

XIX. Glimpses of Central America 

Cities and Scenery of the Western Plateau — Passion-Plays and 
Religious Processions — Progress of Costa Rica — Paction Feuds 
and Standing Armies — The Barrundia Affair — Federation 
and Railway Construction 376 

XX. Our Continent 

European Commercial Dependencies — The Monroe Doctrine Un- 
intelligible to Southern Races — The Pan-American Congress 

— The Reciprocity Policy — The Three Americas' Railway — 
Interoceanic Canals — American Trade Dependent upon the 
Reproduction of European Enterprise 390 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

PKiNCESs's PALACE, PETROPOLis Frontispiecc 

Fronting page 

author's itinerary 1 

MARKET SCENE, DANISH WEST INDIES 6 

PERNAMBUCO 16 

BAHIA 32 

A BRAZILIAN PORT . 60 

PLAZA CAGANCHA, MONTEVIDEO 82 

STREET IN BUENOS AYRES 90 

CATHEDRAL AND CABILDO, CORDOVA 104 

ARTURO PRAT MONUMENT, VALPARAISO 154 

NEW VERRUGAS BRIDGE 184 

CATHEDRAL, LIMA 198 

CARACAS, FROM PUBLIC GARDENS 234 

STREET SCENE IN BARBADOES 246 

PLAZA IN CIENEUEGOS 266 

MORELIA 310 

MOUTH OF THE CHAGRES 392 



TROPICAL AMERICA 



TROPICAL AMERICA 



A VOYAGE TO RIO 

SHORT NOTICE FOR A LONG JOURNEY — A CARGO OF 

JONAHS ST. THOMAS AS A NAVAL STATION LIGHTS 

AND SHADOWS OF WEST INDIAN HISTORY GLIMPSES 

OF MARTINIQUE AND BARBADOES — BRAZILIAN COAST 
TOWNS EVOLUTION OF NATIVE COSTUMES CHARAC- 
TERISTICS OF RIO DE JANEIRO 

For a journey around Tropical America I received 
the short notice of forty-eight hours. The summons 
came as the sequel to the lucky twirl of a penny. The 
revolution in Brazil had occurred on the 15th of No- 
vember, 1889, but for three days the press despatches 
had been meg,gre and unintelligible. One afternoon, 
as I was sitting at the reading-table of one of the 
pleasantest editorial rooms in New York, an associate 
exclaimed, " Somebody ought to go to Brazil by the 
first steamer ! " The prospect of a long voyage in the 
tropics opened an attractive vista before eyes that were 
weary of looking at the four walls of the same room 
after twenty years of office routine. "I am ready," 
was my quick response, "unless you wish to go. Or 
shall we flip a penny for it ? " Laughingly we agreed 
that the winner was to sail for Rio de Janeiro, while 

1 



2 TROPICAL AMERICA 

the loser was to present the case to the editor and 
obtain leave of absence and an adequate letter of credit. 
The penny came to me. The loser was as good as his 
word in arranging the details, but serious argument was 
not required ; for without our knowledge the editor had 
already decided to send a correspondent and had ascer- 
tained that a steamer was to sail for Brazil on the 20th. 
The lucky penny removed a generous competitor and 
enabled me to spend nine months in Tropical America. 
The commission was enlarged so as to include a journey 
over the Andes from the Plate and a voyage along the 
west coast to Peru and Ecuador, and thence by the 
Isthmus to Caracas ; and another winter found me 
again in the West Indies on the way to Mexico and 
Central America. 

Worse fortune can befall a traveller than to start on 
a circuit of Tropical America without a longer warning 
than forty-eight hours. Panic-mongers will not have 
time to alarm him with forecasts of pestilence and 
imprisonment in quarantine. He will not study routes, 
nor make elaborate plans, but will be content to drift 
with the languid courses of travel in Manana lands 
where Yankee energy is only weariness to the flesh. 
He will set out with a light equipment and not have 
leisure for collecting a travelling library. Nine mouths 
in Tropical America have convinced me that my great- 
est stroke of luck, after the turn of the penny, was the 
short notice for the journey. I started without useless 
baggage, and being dependent wholly upon my own 
observations was under no obligation to verify the im- 
pressions of book-writers. Foreign countries and races 
were my only books, and I had at least an American 
pair of eyes with which to read them. In order to 



A VOYAGE TO RIO 3 

derive the largest benefit from such a journey one must 
leave behind him prejudices and theories, and be pre- 
pared to see things as they are, without seeking to 
adjust new facts to preconceived notions, nor to assimi- 
late the opinions of old-time travellers. Every nation 
has characteristic traits and institutions, and the highest 
value of travel consists in the perception of their signif- 
icance. Every race has elements of .genius in its civili- 
zation and there is something in its experience which 
can be made helpful to nations differing from it in creed 
or in breed. If one wishes not only to increase his 
stock of facts, but also to learn their real meaning, he 
must not be encumbered, when he travels, with theories, 
his own or other men's. Otherwise he cannot become 
a free conduit for communicating the freshest intelli- 
gence and the best influences of other countries to his 
own. If he begins by taking Dr. Johnson's advice and 
divesting his mind of cant, he will be a more tolerant 
critic of men, institutions, and alien forms of civili- 
zation. 

The steamer Advance^ after leaving New York, ran 
into Newport News to coal for the long voyage and to 
receive its full complement of passengers. There were 
twenty refugees from a northern winter taking passage 
for Barbadoes ; there was a group of Brazilians bound 
for Rio de Janeiro, one of them an ardent Republican ; 
there was an American dentist with a drove of Ken- 
tucky horses consigned to the Argentine ; there was an 
agent of an electric plant company, planning an ex- 
tended business tour in the Plate countries and in 
Brazil ; there were two American families fidgeting a 
month in advance over the possibilities of quarantine at 
Montevideo ; there was an ardent young Spaniard from 



4 TROPICAL AMERICA 

La Plata, doomed to fall desperately in love with the 
prettiest of the American girls booked for the Wind- 
ward Islands ; and there was a large company of Pres- 
byterian missionaries, including the moderator of the 
Brazilian Synod, several young ministers, with Portu- 
guese to cram on the voyage, and two charming and 
intelligent ladies, teachers in the Protestant schools of 
Sao Paulo. A long cruise was before us, and the re- 
sources of a shipload of passengers gave promise of 
varied entertainment and relief from weariness of the 
sea. 

" Too many Jonahs ! " was an exclamation frequently 
heard on the ship during the next month of constant 
detention and laborious progress. At the outset arose 
an unexpected complication, for which the presence of 
so large a missionary force could not be held account- 
able even by the most superstitious sailor, A few hours 
before the steamer was to sail the sharp report of a 
pistol-shot was heard between decks with sounds of 
scuffling and scurrying and angry cries of " Murder ! " 
and " Arrest him ! " One of the assistant engineers had 
fired upon the chief cook, but happily without effect. 
The steward and his force demanded the immediate dis- 
charge of the assailant, but the chief engineer pleaded 
with the captain for his retention and was allowed to 
have his way. While this parley was proceeding, the 
firemen took counsel together and concluded that it 
would be dangerous for them to work under the super- 
vision of an intemperate and passionate officer. They 
went to their bunks, packed their kits and marched in 
single file down the gangway-plank, deserting the ship. 
While negotiations were pending for securing their 
return to duty the assistant engineer made a second 



A VOYAGE TO EIO 6 

assault upon one of the steward's men. The cooks and 
cabin-boys at once revolted, and there was a menace of 
a second series of desertions from the steward's depart- 
ment. The captain forestalled a mutiny in cabin and 
scullery by discharging the turbulent engineer. A raw 
force of untrained coal-heavers was hired, and late in 
the evening the ship cast off from the wharf and headed 
for the open sea. A Jonah on land was without reproach 
among the marines; but when the voyage was fairly 
begun the poor missionaries were chaffed unmercifully, 
and threatened with immersion in the sea whenever 
currents were . adverse, or the machinery was out of 
gear, or the ship ran aground on a sand-bar or caught 
the ebb of the tide in entering port. 

The run to St. Thomas was made in six days through 
waters of luminous blue steadily deepening in tone and 
under a sky in which white clouds were constantly 
quickening their flight on the wings of the trade winds. 
After the Gulf Stream was crossed a lonely reach of the 
sea was entered where there were no birds in the air and 
where the sun-baths of porpoises and the pantomime of 
flying-fish ceased. Dr. Lane, who had a talent for coin- 
ing striking expressions, described it as one of the deserts 
of the ocean. A very bright and genial companion was 
this Presbyterian missionary. For twenty years he had 
been in Brazil preaching in mission chapels and on street 
corners, printing Protestant tracts and organizing large 
and successful schools. A keen controversialist, he had 
a rich vein of Irish humor. I do not know how success- 
ful he was in translating his jokes into Portuguese, but 
the merry twinkle in his eyes must have informed his 
Protestant converts that the solemn earnestness of the 
missionary was overlaid with genial pleasantry. 



6 TEOPICAL AMERICA 

St. Thomas has one of the most picturesque harbors 
to be entered in the West Indies. At daybreak we drew 
near the high cliffs at the entrance and caught an entranc- 
ing glimpse of the town built on three hillsides with a 
background of mountains and here and there a miniature 
castle of the days of the buccaneers. The whitewashed 
walls of the shops and houses surmounted with red-tiled 
roofs were relieved by the green slopes of the hills with 
their rocky and barren crests. As it is approached from 
the harbor light St. Thomas is a silhouette of singular 
beauty ; but like nearly all West Indian towns it has 
the self-conscious air of having seen better days and of 
suffering from the decline of trade. The firing of the 
steamer's gun brought a swarm of negroes in small boats 
from the shore, and the familiar cries and antics of divers 
in search of pennies were speedily repeated for the bene- 
fit of the passengers. A young German from Zanzibar 
accompanied me to a great barrack of a hotel, where we 
had a genuine West Indian breakfast before starting out 
to make a round of calls on the consuls and to see the 
governor's residence, the shops, and the sights of the 
town. At every turn we met fellow-passengers enjoy- 
ing heartily the pleasure of a day on shore after a week 
at sea. 

What interested me most in St. Thomas was the 
harbor. It is capacious, fairly deep, and completely 
land-locked, except at the narrow entrance. As a naval 
station for the United States it would be markedly 
superior to either Samana Bay or Mole San Nicolas in 
the island of San Domingo. Those harbors are entered 
with difficulty, and are incapable of impregnable de- 
fence. St. ThomaSj with its circular basin, commanded 
by abrupt hillsides, and with its lofty headlands guard- 



A VOYAGE TO EIO 7 

ing the entrance, could be converted into another Malta. 
It is not strange that Secretary Seward, when he visited 
the island, while recovering from the wounds of an as- 
sassin's knife, was greatly impressed with the advan- 
tages of the harbor. In view of recent negotiations for 
the acquisition of inferior coaling-stations in an island 
rent with civil war, where the United States govern- 
ment would be compelled to intervene constantly in 
political affairs, it is most unfortunate that his sagacious 
scheme was never carried out. President Lincoln favored 
the project toward the close of his first administration, 
because the inhospitality of British ports to Union cruis- 
ers and the enforcement of the twenty-four-hours' rule 
against them were a source of embarrassment in naval 
operations. If a coaling-station was urgently needed 
then for the avoidance of the restrictions of neutral 
ports, it will be required in any future war in which 
the United States may engage. St. Thomas, by virtue 
of its central position among the European possessions 
in America, and its strategic relations with the Isthmus 
and Nicaragua Canal routes, and the courses of trade 
with Brazil, would be an ideal coaling-station. The 
island is worth intrinsically less than it was when Sec- 
retary Seward visited it. Its commercial importance has 
declined since the Royal Mail steamers made Barba- 
does the centre of trade and mail communications in the 
Lesser Antilles. The island itself, like St. John, is 
unproductive, but Santa Cruz has a well-organized sugar 
industry capable of profitable development. There was 
a transitory revival of the fortunes of St. Thomas dur- 
ing the American Civil War, but the Danes were willing 
to sell the island to Secretary Seward, and would prob- 
ably take less for it now than they asked for it then. 



8 TROPICAL AMERICA 

The Swedes relinquished St. Bartholomew to the French 
in 1878. The Dutch would not stand upon the price 
if there were a purchaser bargaining for St. Eustatius 
and Saba. 

From St. Thomas the course of the Advance lay- 
nearly southeast to Martinique. Beginning with the 
swarm of the Virgin Islands, where the lovely legend 
of Ursula and her legion of attendants is brought to 
mind, the traveller in the Lesser Antilles repeats a 
litany to the saints as he sails. The Spanish system 
of nomenclature was simple. When islands were dis- 
covered in the early voyages, the calendar was piously 
consulted, and the names were taken from the saints' 
days. The Spanish navigators were satisfied with nam- 
ing these beautiful islands. With the exception of 
Trinidad, they made no attempt to colonize them. For 
a century after the voyages of Columbus the four large 
islands of the West Indian archipelago were tenanted 
by gold-hunters and adventurers from Spain, but the 
crescent of gray pearls and dazzling emeralds from 
Porto Rico to the Orinoco was allowed to lie neglected 
and despised in the lap of the Caribbean. Another 
century passed, and the fleets of maritime Europe were 
battling for them in four great wars as the most pre- 
cious jewels of the French, English, and Spanish crowns. 
A hundred years of peace have followed a hundred years 
of war, and the Lesser Antilles to-day are virtually 
abandoned to hives of blacks. Islands of enchanting 
loveliness, rising out of the bluest of seas, and floating 
like a mirage of fairyland in the golden vistas of the 
tropics, how unconscious they seem of the strange muta- 
tions and sharp contrasts of their fortunes ! Whether 
they have been highly prized or neglected, nature's 



A VOYAGE TO RIO 9 

dower of beauty has been always fresh, radiant in the 
lights, and undimmed by the shadows, of West Indian 
history. 

The Virgin Islands, with the exception of St. Thomas 
and Santa Cruz, are low-lying reefs in an arid belt where 
there is a slight rainfall. With St. Kitt's begins the 
procession of highland islands, with blue peaks hooded 
by clouds and well-watered slopes on which sugarcane 
is cultivated to the ribbon of white beach at the water's 
edge. Then follow the gray cone of Nevis ; the level 
meadows of Antigua, with St. John's, the capital, em- 
bowered in pineapple groves and sugar plantations; 
Montserrat, with its stately mountains ; Guadeloupe, 
with its rugged coast, its lofty volcano, and its quaint 
French town, Pointe-a-Pitre ; Dominica, with a grandeur 
of scenery unrivalled in the West Indies ; and Marti- 
nique at the end of the Leeward group, with the Wind- 
ward Islands, St. Lucia, St. Vincent, the Grenadines, 
and Grenada to the south, and Barbadoes to the east on 
the outer rim of the archipelago. Among these islands 
St. Kitt's was the common centre of English and French 
colonization, the two rivals beginning their career of 
maritime emulation and naval conflict by settling side 
by side. Thence the French passed rapidly to Guade- 
loupe, Dominica, Martinique, and the Windward Islands, 
while the English occupied Barbadoes, Nevis, Antigua, 
Montserrat, Anguilla, Barbuda, and the Bahamas. 
Cromwell's raid upon Jamaica opened a new base for 
English colonization just as the occupation of Hayti 
enlarged the field of French enterprise. During the 
wars of the Spanish Succession and of Pitt and Napo- 
leon the principal islands were taken and recaptured 
many times. Dominica, St. Vincent, and Grenada fell 



10 TROPICAL AMERICA 

to England after the conquest of Canada ; all the islands 
except Barbadoes and St. Lucia were regained by France 
after Yorktown ; Rodney's genius restored the West 
Indian Empire to England in the sea-fight between 
Dominica and Guadeloupe ; Trinidad was wrested from 
Spain in 1797, and St. Lucia, Tobago, and British 
Guiana from France and her forced allies in 1803. 

The Spanish navigators were strictly logical in their 
classification of the West Indies according to exposure 
to the prevailing trade wind. The entire group of the 
Lesser Antilles, from St. Thomas to Trinidad, was 
known in their records of discovery as the Windward 
Islands, while the four largest Antilles, Cuba, San 
Domingo, Jamaica, and Porto Rico, were named the 
Leeward Islands. The present classification is artificial, 
having been ordered for administrative purposes. The 
Leeward is the northerly group stretching from the 
Virgin Islands to Dominica. The three islands of St. 
Lucia, St. Vincent, and Grenada, with the tiny Grena- 
dines, are officially known as the Windward group. 
Barbadoes, which lies most to the windward, is excluded 
from the second group because it has a governor of its 
own and is entirely distinct in its administrative system. 
Tobago, being united with Trinidad in colonial govern- 
ment, is also separated from its windward neighbors. 
The largest town is St. John's, Antigua, the seat of 
government of the Leeward group. The best harbor is 
Castries Bay in St. Lucia, which the British govern- 
ment has strongly fortified and converted into a naval 
and military station. The administrative systems of the 
two groups are similar, and each colonial governor has 
the despairing task of controlling a horde of ignorant 
blacks with the support of a few hundreds of whites. 



A VOYAGE TO EIO 11 

Poor gray islands that have witnessed centuries of war- 
fare, how has their lustre been tarnished in the sight of 
Europe ! No longer precious jewels of a foreign crown, 
they are now black pearls of the same water as Hayti. 

In marked contrast with the decadence of Dominica 
are the French islands, Guadeloupe and Martinique. 
The first is superior to the other two in natural re- 
sources, but under British rule nothing has been made 
of it. There is only a handful of whites in Dominica 
among a degraded swarm of blacks. Roseau is one of 
the most forlorn of West Indian towns, utterly without 
promise of industrial revival. The French islands are 
not only more densely populated than Dominica, but 
their industries are diversified ; sugar-planting is eco- 
nomically managed, commerce is not declining, and the 
best Creole race to be found in the West Indies is con- 
tented and loyal to the mother country. Guadeloupe 
and Martinique are represented in the French Assembly 
and have all the privileges of responsible home rule. 
France has protected their interests at high cost to its 
own treasury. It has opened its markets to their prod- 
uce, promoted their industries by bounties, and con- 
tinued to this day to take nearly all they have to export. 
They have not been cast off by an unnatural mother, 
but have been cherished as the only remaining children 
of a colonial family once large and powerful. 

No traveller can visit Martinique without being im- 
pressed with a conviction that Rodney's splendid sea- 
fight, by which Dominica and other islands were wrested 
from the French, was a grave misfortune to the Lesser 
Antilles. If the islands, which were settled by the 
French, had not been regained by England, there would 
have been a larger measure of prosperity to-day in the 



12 TROPICAL AMERICA 

Leeward and Windward groups. No scenic picture in 
Tropical America is more beautiful than the quaint town 
of St. Pierre with Mt. Pelde behind it. The French 
settlers who founded the city were good Catholics and 
respected the memory of their patron saint when they 
laid its foundations on solid rock at the edge of a semi- 
circular bay. The houses are built of stone, and, while 
small and unpretentious, have an aspect of massiveness. 
A cathedral with two white towers is in the centre, and 
artistically grouped around it are houses and shops with 
red tiled roofs and gabled dormers. It is a French city 
with all the characteristics of the seventeenth century, 
but it has not been allowed to fall into ruin or to lose 
its air of antique refinement. The prevailing colors in 
the house-fronts are yellow and gray, with blue or green 
in the window shutters, and there is something in the 
rambling disorder of the crooked and steep lanes that 
bespeaks an artistic strain in the Creole blood. The 
stone pavements are scrupulously clean ; the flights of 
steps leading upward from the landing-pier open into 
miniature rues filled with a gaily dressed and pleasure- 
loving populace ; the market is one of the best in the 
West Indies ; palms wave their long plumes in numer- 
ous little squares and breathing-nooks ; there are water- 
courses tumbling down the hillside and cooling the 
heated air, and fountains are seen unexpectedly in the 
sharp turns of the streets. St. Pierre has no statue of 
Josephine encircled by palms, like its rival. Fort de 
France, but it is more picturesque, prosperous, and ener- 
getic. The stone foundations of Fort de France have 
been shattered by earthquake shocks, and the town has 
been rebuilt with frame houses at the sacrifice of quaint 
characteristics. The memory of the lovely Creole, who 



A VOYAGE TO KIO 13 

became the wife and empress of the world's greatest 
soldier does not suffice to compensate for an inferior 
scenic setting and for signs of decadence. St. Pierre 
is the most interesting town of the West Indies. Amer- 
icans have not yet discovered it, but when they do they 
will convert it into a Riviera more alluring than Nassau 
or Barbadoes. 

From Martinique the Advance ran to windward a 
night and a day, outside the circle of the highland 
islands, until Barbadoes was reached on a lovely Sunday 
forenoon. Barbadoes is, after St. Kitt's, the oldest of 
the British settlements in the West Indies, and every 
available acre of its limited area has been for genera- 
tions under thorough cultivation. The white descend- 
ants of the Cavaliers and Roundheads of the early 
colonial period have not abandoned their homes and 
plantations, but remain in about the same number as in 
1800. Relatively their strength has been reduced; for 
while there were then 15,000 whites to 60,000 blacks, 
there are now 16,000 whites to 164,000 blacks. This 
makes the island one of the most densely populated 
districts of Tropical America, the average being 1084 
to the square mile. Smaller than either Dominica or 
St.. Lucia, it has an area of 166 square miles, yet with 
its population of 180,000, it rivals the companion col- 
ony of Trinidad and Tobago, with an area of 1869 
square miles. 

The two English colonies differ markedly in their 
history, one having been continuously English in its 
traditions, while the other was one of the last con- 
quests from Spain in the West Indies. Barbadoes was 
a well-cultivated garden when Trinidad, of which 
nothing had been made under Spanish rule, passed 



14 TROPICAL AMERICA 

under British rule, to be converted, by the development 
of its resources, into the most prosperous of the Lesser 
Antilles. The smaller island had its single industry, 
cane sugar, but when every acre was planted and en- 
riched with fertilizers the limit of its productiveness 
was reached. Beyond increasing by improved machin- 
ery the percentage of sugar to be squeezed from the 
cane, it could do nothing to improve its fortunes. With 
a population already so dense that there was hardly 
ground to spare for raising yams to keep the negroes 
alive, there was no chance for securing a superior class 
of labor from the East Indies. Trinidad, like British 
Guiana, could increase its population one-third by im- 
porting coolies, and could vary its industries by culti- 
vating cacao and fruit as well as sugar, and by exporting 
asphalt from its famous lake. It was an undeveloped 
island, and its governors could report material gains in 
prosperity from year to year. As for Barbadoes, it had 
nothing to hope for except increased commercial pres- 
tige as the main shipping and distributing point of the 
Lesser Antilles, and enlarged patronage as a winter 
resort. 

Bridgetown is now a bustling town with a popu- 
lation of 25,000, and a British garrison at St. Ann's 
Castle on the southern edge of Carlisle Bay. A rail- 
way line, twenty-four miles in length, runs across the 
island, and there are fine roads in all the parishes. 
All the characteristics of the town are markedly Eng- 
lish, from the statue of Nelson in a mimic Trafalgar 
Square to the cathedral in the most densely populated 
quarter. The Avhites stand in no apprehension of being 
ruled by the blacks, for wliile largely outnumbered they 
are strong enough to maintain resolutely their ascend- 



A VOYAGE TO KIO 15 

ency. The governor has the support of a body of white 
colonists almost fanatical in their loyalty to England ; 
but the island is a commercial dependency of the United 
States. Its food supplies are derived almost wholly 
from the only market where its surplus sugar can be 
sold. 

The" Advance got off at midnight and continued her 
course to the mouth of the Amazon. It was a six days' 
run before the yellow shoals of the delta were descried. 
Among accumulations of sand, drift, and slime, which an 
equatorial sun clothes with rank verdure, the Amazon 
squanders resources borrowed from a hundred tributa- 
ries ; but so vast are its reserves of power, that it pre- 
serves its identity for leagues seaward, and forms currents 
which are felt fifty or a hundred miles from the delta. 
Other rivers are instantly swallowed up by the sea ; but 
the Amazon continues its triumphant course, a river in 
the ocean. As the missionaries had been held respon- 
sible by the jovial captain for a partial paralysis of the 
machinery, for the unusual resistance of the ocean cur- 
rents, and for the quarantine at Barbadoes, so they 
were also reproached for a final mishap at the mouth of 
the river. The Indian pilot, misjudging the depth of 
water, ran the ship aground on one of the shifting bars, 
and for hours there was a desperate struggle to get her 
off. The captain's facetious proposal to lighten the ship 
by discharging the cargo of Jonahs was received good- 
humoredly by the long-suffering missionaries. As their 
attention had been called on the previous day to a school 
of whales spouting near the equator, their minds might 
well have been filled with foreboding of their fate, if 
any further accident were to befall the belated Advance. 
Accident there was none, but there was serious detention 



16 TROPICAL AMERICA 

at each of the ports oif which the ship anchored before 
its arrival at the Brazilian capital. As the passengers 
in each instance had a full day ashore, they had no cause 
for complaint. They had leisure for exploring four char- 
acteristic coast towns, — Pard, lying at the gateway of the 
most wonderful river system of the world, with an equa- 
torial empire behind it where nature seems to conquer 
man ; Maranhao, with moss-grown streets and declining 
commerce, shrinking from sight in the reaches of an 
inaccessible lagoon ; Pernambuco, with its natural break- 
water, a Brazilian Venice encircled by harbor and sea, 
and pierced by narrow rivers ; and Bahia, built like 
Quebec on high bluffs, with a lower town cluttered in a 
jumble of disorder along the water's edge. 

Each Brazilian coast city seems to have its character- 
istic colors. Par4 is what artistic decorators would 
describe as a symphony in green ; Maranhao is an old 
bit of washed-out blue ; Pernambuco affects a cheap and 
spongy alabaster in its gray and white ; and Bahia is 
a study of buff and brown. If the architects sought to 
set the prevailing tone of color in these towns when 
they fashioned their sombre-hued temples and monas- 
teries, they have been baffled by the love of vivid color- 
ing inherent in the Portuguese blood. It may be that 
the primal hints for intensity in decorative effects have 
been received from nature. Nowhere is the ocean of so 
pronounced a blue as in tropical Brazil. Under no con- 
ditions of light or cloud is there the faintest touch of 
the North Atlantic green. It is literally the matchless 
dark blue sea of which poets have sung. Over it arches 
the dome of the tropical sky, frescoed in tones of lumi- 
nous blue, incomparably richer than the blue of a northern 
sky. Against this background of vivid blue stand out 



A VOYAGE TO RIO 17 

the intense green and flaming scarlet of tropical vegeta- 
tion. While there are no trees in the South American 
woods which can be compared in form and symmetry with 
the oaks, elms, pines, chestnuts, walnuts, and conifers 
of a northern forest, the foliage has richer and deeper 
tints in its perennial freshness. The mangoes, with 
their dark olive leaves, match the bright and gaudy 
feathers of the palm. The mosses clinging to the cliffs, 
the tall, luxuriant grasses in shaded ravines, and the 
rank parasites overspreading with wanton growth the 
woodland thickets and rocky hillsides, furnish varied 
shades of green as intense as the blue of sky or ocean. 
In contrast with the green, but even stronger in color, 
are the burning scarlet, the royal purple, and the lumi- 
nous yellow shining out from parterres of flowers in the 
gardens. Tropical flowers, while less fragrant and hav- 
ing less delicacy of form than the flowers of temperate 
climes, are more vivid in hue. Nature sets the example 
of profusion of color in Brazil, and man instinctively 
follows it in building and decorating the towns. Portu- 
guese tiling can be had in all colors and patterns, and 
bright, showy paint does not cost more than the dull 
and quiet shades. 

If each coast town has its characteristic colors, so also 
each has its own costumes for the swarming black popu- 
lation. From the equator to the tropic there is a 
process of evolution in dress. At Par4 and Maranhao 
the negro children are stark naked. At Pernambuco 
and Bahia they wear calico dresses. At Par4 the men 
begin with a pair of trunks without hat, shoes, shirt, or 
coat; at Maranhao they have a loose-fitting shirt flap- 
ping over the trousers ; at Pernambuco a ragged coat is 
slipped over the shirt and a torn straw hat covers the 



18 TROPICAL AMERICA 

head ; and at Bahia, shoes and stockings nearly complete 
the costume of a negro laborer. The costumes of the 
women are developed in the same progressive way. In 
the beginning there is a chemise, or what the ancients 
would have called a long tunic, with head and feet bare. 
Farther down the coast a calico skirt and waist is thrown 
over the chemise, and shoes are worn. At Bahia a light 
wrap is carelessly worn over calico suits of the gayest 
colors and patterns, and there is a lavish display of cheap 
bracelets, brass earrings, and amulets. These are the 
costumes of the lowest classes of blacks. With educa- 
tion and social equality the dress of the negroes and 
mulattoes changes until it is hardly distinguishable 
from that of the Portuguese. The negroes in Bahia 
are superior to those of the northern coast. The women 
who hawk fish or pineapples in the streets are marvels 
of physical development and grace. They are as straight 
as palms and as lithe as willows, and they walk like 
Greek goddesses. With purple, pink, or blue waists cut 
low in the neck, they display arms of the finest model- 
ling, and a development of muscle and sinew and an 
erect and queenly carriage which must be the envy and 
despair of Brazilian ladies of the highest rank. 

In every town are to be seen the domes and crosses 
of churches, monasteries, and convents. Many of these 
structures are empty and virtually closed, the laws 
against monastic orders having been enforced during the 
last decade of the Empire. Whenever I found a church 
open for mass I watched a motley company of kneeling 
worshippers of every shade of color from a white-faced 
Portuguese widow with a lace handkerchief wet with 
tears, to an ebony-black fisherwoman counting her beads 
under a faded shawl. Crude paintings, coarsely designed 



A VOYAGE TO RIO 19 

and ill-dressed images, tawdry gilt ornamentation with- 
out lines of grace, were combined with a general coldness 
of architectural effect. The eye was repelled by the 
shabbiness and bareness of the crumbling churches and 
attracted by the spacious Portuguese mansions with their 
gardens aflame with scarlet and crimson flowers. More 
interesting than the churches and residences were the 
markets and bird-bazaars. A market is ordinarily to be 
regarded as the pulse of the town. If it be well served, 
clean, and orderly, the blood circulation of the com- 
munity may safely be considered as excellent. Judged 
by this test, there are few towns in Brazil in which there 
is sound digestion. The markets are dirty, disorderly, 
and unattractive. There are scanty displays of meats, 
since the mass of the population live on jerked beef from 
the Plate countries. Of fish there is a larger assortment, 
but vegetables are lacking. In Bahia the oranges are 
large and delicious, and mangoes and bananas are abun- 
dant and cheap. The pineapples are mellow, overrun- 
ning with juice and of incomparable flavor. 

After a voyage of thirty-two days from New York the 
most barren ledge of weather-beaten rock would have 
attractions for eyes weary of the wondrous blue splen- 
dors of the tropical seas. The Bay of January with its 
incomparable beauties inspired under these conditions 
the liveliest feelings of admiration and enthusiasm when 
the Advance entered it after a quick run from Bahia. 
Some of my fellow-travellers were disposed to be critical 
and to discriminate against Rio de Janeiro in favor 
of Naples and Sydney in the South Seas; but in my 
intense delight at being relieved from the tedium of a 
protracted voyage, during which every passenger except 
Dr. Lane had talked himself out, I was willing when 



20 TROPICAL AMERICA 

the ship cast anchor off the city to concede everything 
which the most fervid Brazilian would claim for that 
unrivalled harbor. All the da}^ the coast scenery had 
been preparing me for the grandeur of the bay encom- 
passed with its glorious mountains. At breakfast Cape 
Frio was in sight thirty miles away. Slowly it loomed 
up before the eyes, a majestic mountain of rock with its 
ragged crest 1286 feet above the sea. Behind it there 
was a stately procession of mountains forming a con- 
tinuous line of sentries along the coast. For sixty miles 
from the cape these rock-bound giants exchanged their 
signals in guarding the entrance to Rio de Janeiro. 
Then the Sugar Loaf rising 1200 feet abruptly from the 
sea closed the outward file and opened the grand encamp- 
ment of the Rio mountains. A companion promontory 
guarded the entrance to a bay eighty miles in circuit 
where all the navies of the world might find safe anchor- 
age. The bay was encompassed with mountains on 
every side. On the left were Corcovado, the Gavea, and 
Tijuca, with the Organ range in the distance. On the 
right was an amphitheatre of hills, ranging toward the 
Serro do Mar. Imagination creates grotesque pictures 
and resemblances in these granite peaks and overlapping 
ranges. One generation amuses itself with outlining 
Lord Hood's nose in the Gavea and Tijuca, while 
another sees a sleeping giant reclining on his mountain 
bed. The bay with its towering mountain walls remains 
for all time a vision of enchanting beauty. Its surface 
is gemmed with emerald islands and fortifications shin- 
ing in the moonlight like murky pearls ; and where the 
city sits enthroned among its hills and ravines the white 
clouds reflect at night a radiant lustre enkindled by its 
myriad lights. 



A VOYAGE TO EIO 21 

The Brazilian capital will always be embarrassed by 
the riches of its natural advantages. How beautiful and 
picturesque it needs to be in order to be worthy of the 
companionship of those majestic mountains and those 
tranquil waters ! If it be inferior in loveliness to its 
harbor and the amphitheatre of granite peaks and ver- 
dant hillsides, it is still unique and unrivalled among 
South American cities. Half-hidden among its hills, it 
reveals itself with coy modesty to unaccustomed eyes. 
It is a city of magnificent prospects and constant sur- 
prises. Sharply graded streets boldly scale the hillsides 
or cautiously curve around the bases and lead to con- 
cealed suburbs. Castello and Antonio are the natural 
buttresses of the business section of the city ; but Thereza, 
Gloria, and Larangeiras, behind Nova Cintra, are suburbs 
that have steadily grown until they are now favorite 
residence quarters. The shore line is dotted with ham- 
lets and cottages. New vistas of outlying hills and ambi- 
tious suburbs are ever coming into view. Churches, 
convents, and monasteries are constantly looming up in 
unexpected places. The eye is refreshed with glimpses 
of lovely gardens, for which rockbound hillsides are a 
foil ; and from every eminence the bay, with its wonder- 
ful panoramic effects of islands, fortifications, and ship- 
ping, bursts upon the view with endless variety. 

Nature has been too lavish in her bounty of beauty 
for the welfare of Rio de Janeiro. The mountains 
which encircle it shut out the invigorating sea-breezes, 
and leave it in the seasons of inclement heat festering 
with disease and plague-stricken. Nature cannot be 
held wholly responsible for the unhealthfulness of the 
city. Human neglect has multiplied the evils of moun- 
tain shelter. No other great city has been governed 



22 TROPICAL AMERICA 

with less wisdom and prudence than Rio de Janeiro; 
and its population of less than 400,000 is ravaged every 
year by yellow fever, small-pox, and heat fever. Fortu- 
nately, during the winter of the revolution all fears of 
yellow fever were dispelled by welcome rains in Decem- 
ber, and the death rate was reduced to twelve from that 
disease during the closing week of the year. From the 
middle of January to the end of February the plague 
is ordinarily at its height, but the visitation was averted 
by favorable weather, and the people were left exposed 
only to the fever of popular excitement caused by the 
revolution. 

The new Republican government paid three of our 
passengers the compliment of sending out a special 
customs boat to take them ashore when the Advance 
arrived. The Minister of Finance, Senhor Barboza, 
welcomed us to the city by messages of hospitality de- 
livered in high-sounding Portuguese by his brother-in- 
law, Senhor Vianna Bandeira, and translated into equally 
sonorous English by W. P. Tisdel, of Washington. By 
these courtesies I was saved a tedious hour in passing 
the customs line, and enabled to land at once. Mr. Tis- 
del was also the bearer of invitations from Mr. Adams, 
the American minister, whose hospitality I was to 
enjoy in Petropolis, and he had many thoughtful and 
helpful suggestions to make on his own account. The 
Advance lay near the anchorage ground of the gunboat 
to which the imperial family had been taken at mid- 
night in the first stage of their enforced exile. In a 
short time we were climbing the stairs of the landing- 
pier where the unhappy monarch last trod on Brazilian 
soil. In another moment we were passing the shabby 
palace by the water's edge, and it was not long before 



A VOYAGE TO EIO 23 

we were gazing at the quartel and the war-offices where 
the bloodless revolution had occurred. All was peace- 
ful and quiet, albeit the memory of those momentous 
events was still burning in men's memories. In the 
early morning the city was preparing for another day 
of commercial activity, without regard for the misfor- 
tunes of dynasties or for the experiments of constitution- 
makers. The Ouvidor was taking down its shutters 
and opening its doors for a brisk day of Christmas 
trade, with no thought of the pangs of imperial exile 
or of the uncertainties and perplexities of the political 
morrow. The rains had come, and the progress of 
yellow fever had been stayed. The temperature was 
lower, and men would not be falling in the streets 
before noon from that terrible heat fever which resem- 
bles sunstroke. The climate in the capital is so serious 
a matter as to be uppermost in men's minds. Political 
revolutions seem trivial beside the contingencies of 
plague. Yellow Jack is the Emperor of Death, for 
whose downfall and permanent exile Rio de Janeiro 
despairingly hopes. 

As soon as I had been reassured at the American 
consulate respecting the sanitary condition of the city, 
I looked for a comfortable hotel, and found one near 
the Passeio Publico, a beautiful water-side park, com- 
manding from an elevated terrace fine views of the bay 
and Sugar Loaf. There I settled myself for several 
weeks; and since the dinners were excellent and the 
beds tolerable, I was not tempted to change my quar- 
ters. Introductions and invitations followed, and I 
soon had a delightful circle of acquaintances, and felt 
at home in the Brazilian capital. It is a city where one 
can live in comfort and even luxury for nine months in 



24 TROPICAL AMERICA 

the year, and during the heated term, when pestilence 
is to be dreaded, there are suburbs close at hand where 
the timorous traveller can find a safe refuge. There are 
good theatres, excellent restaurants with French cook- 
ing and wines, and innumerable excursions and interest- 
ing sights. The old town lies on a level plain between 
two ranges of hills. The streets are narrow, even the 
Ouvidor being hardly more than a paved lane, and most 
of the buildings are small, with rough stone or brick 
walls plastered on the outside or lined with Portuguese 
tiles. The architecture reproduces the effects of other 
Brazilian coast towns, with more ambitious lines of orna- 
mentation and quieter tones of color. The government 
buildings are not impressive, the Mint and the new 
Custom House being the most pretentious structures. 
The National Library is not worthy of the reputation 
of the capital'. The Misericordia is the largest of the 
hospitals, and it is conducted on humane and scientific 
principles. The churches are numerous, but shabby, 
neglected, and bare. Electric light has been sparingly 
introduced, and the streets are dimly lighted with infe- 
rior gas. The Jardin da Praca d'Acclama^ao is a beauti- 
ful and attractive park within easy walking distance of 
the Ouvidor, with the City Hall, the Mint, the military 
barracks, and the Dom Pedro 11. railway station front- 
ing upon its outer edges. It divides popularity with 
the Passeio Publico on the water-front, and is accessible 
from every quarter, whereas the Botanical Garden, with 
its famous alleys of palms and its bamboo clumps, is an 
hour's drive from the heart of the city. Rio de Janeiro 
is a city of great commercial importance, rivalled only 
by Buenos Ayres in South America, but it is backward 
and almost stationary in municipal improvements and 
modern progress. 



A VOYAGE TO RIO 25 

Great as are the natural advantages of the Brazilian 
capital, and picturesque and inspiring as are the glimpses 
of its mountain and bay scenery, the traveller in mid- 
summer finds his permanent source of recreation in 
watching the throng as it surges night and morning 
through the Ouvidor, and in catching the characteristic 
traits of the people. He soon ascertains that Rio de 
Janeiro aspires to be like Paris, and that it closely 
imitates in customs, manners, and politics the French 
people. There is a marked touch of Gallic flippancy in 
the tone of private conversation and public life. The 
Provisional Government of the revolutionary period 
was French rather than English, American, or Portu- 
guese. One could feel in the Ouvidor the influence of 
Parisian thought and literature in forming the habits of 
thought and manner of life of the Brazilian capital. It 
is an open question whether a century of constitutional 
liberty in the United States has exerted as much influ- 
ence in promoting the growth of republican sentiment 
there as the cycle of imitation during which French 
books have been read, and the Parisian philosophy of 
life practically adopted. Intelligent Brazilians are fond 
of newspapers, and prefer the French type. Large edi- 
tions are printed every afternoon, and from the newsboys' 
excited outcries and frantic gestures one is tempted to 
believe that a fresh revolution has occurred, and the Em- 
pire been restored. Brazilians love excitement, noise, 
and fireworks. Before the revolution, almost the only 
town shows were the image-bearing processions during 
Holy Week and on saints' days. During the early 
weeks of the Republic files of troops were constantly 
parading, and the music of the fife and drum was heard 
morning and night. The revolution brought with it 
much pleasurable excitement for a volatile population. 



II 



RIO'S THREE GLORIOUS DAYS 

MUTINY OF THE BATTALIONS GENERAL DEODORO'S BRA- 
VADO THE REPUBLIC PROCLAIMED THE EMPEROR's 

SURRENDER — AN ORLEANS BARGAIN GENERAL CAUSES 

OF DISAFFECTION WITH THE EMPIRE THE REVOLUTION 

A LOTTERY 

The stoiy of the Three Glorious Days, as the revo- 
lution of November, 1889, is already known in Brazil, 
was singularly bare of incident and excitement. The 
imperial government was overturned by what was 
hardly more than a parade of a few insubordinate 
battalions, who were disaffected because they had been 
ordered to go to a remote post in the interior. If there 
was any preconcerted plan among the revolutionary 
leaders, it was not formed before the night of November 
9, 1889, when the Prime Minister was entertaining the 
officers of the Chilian ironclad Ahnirante Cochrane at 
a ball. On that night disaffected officers were known 
to be in consultation, but probably nothing was more 
remote from their thoughts than the expulsion of the 
Emperor from the throne. The Republican journals 
had been asserting for several weeks that the govern- 
ment intended to scatter the battalions among the prov- 
inces, and after completing the organization of a 
National Guard to proclaim the Princess as Empress, 

26 



KIO'S THREE GLORIOUS DAYS 27 

the Emperor being willing to retire in her favor. 
Whether this was true or false, the officers were discon- 
tented and disposed to believe that the crown intended 
to humiliate them. Military agitators encouraged these 
suspicions. Republican leaders while not apprehending 
a revolution during the lifetime of the Emperor were in 
the habit of discussing at their clubs what would be the 
best method of procedure after his death. Suddenly 
the military outbreak revealed the helplessness of the 
throne. The leaders perceived their opportunity with- 
out having accurately forecast it. They acted almost 
as spontaneously as the soldiers, who found themselves 
shouting for a Republic as they were marching down 
the Ouvidor. 

On November 14, 1889, two infantry battalions which 
had been ordered to leave the city the next morning 
showed signs of insubordination. The Minister of War 
was warned that there was danger of a general mutiny, 
but after consulting with his colleagues in the evening 
he decided to enforce discipline. There were in the 
capital about 2400 soldiers of all branches of the 
service. The Minister of War determined to concen- 
trate this force, and with the aid of the marine corps 
and the police to compel the mutineers to obey orders 
for their transfer to a distant province. While he 
was preparing to overpower the insubordinate battal- 
ions, the mutiny was spreading. The officers of the 
Second Brigade stationed at Sao Christovao resolved 
to make common cause with the rebels, and sent word 
to General Deodoro da Fonseca that they would march 
to the War Offices early in the morning. These offices 
were situated in the heart of the city at the Campo 
Sant' Anna quartel, the general military barracks. 



28 TROPICAL AMERICA 

At sunrise the city was without premonitions of the 
revolution. The Minister of War, apprehending trouble 
at the quartel, had reinforced the police with a small 
body of marines and a corps of firemen. He had also 
recruited in Nictheroy an additional force of police. 
Soon after daybreak word was received at the War 
Office that the Second Brigade had revolted and were 
marching from Sao Christovao. Soon afterward it was 
learned that the cadets of the military school at Boto- 
fogo had seized their arms and were heading for the 
quartel. The Minister of War attempted to induce one 
of the generals at headquarters to rally a force against 
the Second Brigade, but received a blunt refusal. He 
then ordered a battalion to intercept the cadets, but the 
troops would not obey him. When the Second Brigade, 
headed by the Emperor's Guard, the First Cavalry^ filed 
in front of the War Office and invested the quartel, it 
was evident that the troops inside could not be depended 
upon to oppose them. General Deodoro, who had been 
seriously ill at his house on the previous day, was in 
command of the besieging force, and summoned the 
Ministers to surrender. The Prime Minister, who had 
arrived at the War Office with other associates, returned 
a defiant answer ; but within half an hour he was con- 
vinced that defence was hopeless. The troops were aU 
in revolt, and the police and the firemen were in sympa- 
thy with them. 

Meanwhile, the Minister of Marine, Baron Ladario, 
had left the quartel without an escort, to give instruc- 
tions to a company of marines. When outside the door 
he was surrounded by several cavahymen and called 
upon "to surrender. Drawing a revolver, he tried to 
shoot one of the insurgents, but the cartridge missed 



RIO'S THREE GLORIOtTS DAYS 29 

fire. General Deodoro then accosted him and warned 
him that he was a prisoner. The Minister fired upon 
him without effect. The soldiers at once returned the 
shot, and he fell to the ground seriously but not fatally 
wounded. This official, who fired the only shots in 
defence of the Empire, had served for several years in 
the United States navy. 

At nine o'clock the mutinous troops of the Second 
Brigade were still outside the quartel, and the remaining 
military force was drawn up inside on the parade-ground. 
By a preconcerted arrangement the gates were suddenly 
opened, and Deodoro mounted on a fine horse rode in 
and approached the files of soldiers. Nothing was more 
remarkable in the events of the day than this trium- 
phant bit of bravado. The Ministers were present, but 
they made no effort to secure his arrest. He rode 
along the line and inspected the men, slowly receiving 
a salute as he passed. Then he turned his horse toward 
the gates, and the troops with one consent broke ranks 
and followed him into the street. The garrison by 
deserting the Ministers left them at the mercy of the 
insurgents. The general after conferring with the 
adjutant-general announced that the army had deposed 
the Ministry. The Prime Minister and the Minister of 
War were placed under arrest. A salute of twenty-one 
guns was fired. The troops then marched through the 
Ouvidor with a swaggering air of triumph. It was 
hardly ten o'clock, and only one man had been wounded. 

The Ministry had fallen, but not the Empire. The 
Emperor was known to be hastening to the city from 
Petropolis, having been summoned by Count Ouro 
Preto, the Prime Minister. Before his arrival at the 
palace the Republic had been proclaimed. The troops 



30 TROPICAL AMERICA 

had not revolted against the Emperor, but only against 
the administration of the War Office. At the outset 
they would have been satisfied with the appointment of 
a new Minister of War, but involuntarily as they were 
marching in the streets they began to shout for the 
Republic. The overthrow of the Ministry revealed the 
defenceless condition of the imperial family. The facil- 
ity with which the revolution could be carried to its 
logical result tempted the leaders to go on and complete 
the work. Among the Republican agitators who had 
joined the insurgents were Colonel Benjamin Constant, 
of the Military School, and Quintino Bocayuva, editor 
of a prominent journal. After a brief conference they 
made arrangements for holding a meeting in the City 
Hall at three o'clock, in favor of the establishment of a 
republic. With cadets singing in the streets, soldiers 
shouting themselves hoarse, flags fluttering from every 
house, and enthusiasm spreading from hillside to hill- 
side in the grim old capital. General Deodoro no longer 
hesitated. The Republic was proclaimed and a provis- 
ional government with a chief and seven Ministers was 
organized. At the City Hall after a speech from a 
popular agitator the Republic was accepted by a large 
concourse with every sign of public favor. Late edi- 
tions of the evening journals published the first decree 
of the Provisional Government establishing the United 
States of Brazil. 

The Emperor and the Empress had arrived during 
the afternoon at the palace without escort from the 
Prainha and had been joined by the Princess and her 
husband, Count d'Eu. The aged sovereign could not 
be convinced that anything more serious than a minis- 
terial crisis had occurred. At half-past three o'clock 



EIO'S THREE GLORIOUS DAYS 31 

he received the resignations of the Ministers and asked 
Senator Saraiva to form a new government. The sena- 
tor in declining to undertake the task sought to explain 
how critical was the situation. As hour after hour 
passed, signs of the dissolution of the Empire were mul- 
tiplied. Every branch of the civil service in the capital 
was controlled by the revolutionists, and before nightfall 
the telegraph wires were bearing messages betokening 
the acceptance of the new order by the provinces. 
Guards were stationed at the doors of the palace, and 
the Emperor passed a sleepless night, humiliated by the 
thought that he was a prisoner and could no longer 
depend upon the loyalty of his people. So ended the 
first day of the revolution. 

On the morning of the second day there were hurried 
consultations between the Emperor and his distracted 
family and ineffectual efforts to secure the services of a 
new Prime Minister. The guards in front of the palace 
were doubled and precautions taken by the revolution- 
ary leaders to cut off communication between the occu- 
pants and their friends outside. At two o'clock, after 
an anxious morning, during which his helplessness was 
revealed, the Emperor received from the Provisional 
Government a summons to leave the country within 
twenty-four hours. It was embodied in an imperious 
letter from General Deodoro, in which the presence of 
the royal family in Brazil was declared to be incompati- 
ble with the new political situation. The Emperor was 
reminded of the patriotic example of his father, who had 
abdicated under similar circumstances nearly sixty years 
before, and was offered transportation to Europe and a 
continuance of the income which he had received from 
the State. Consultations with the Republican leaders 



d2 TROPICAL AMERICA 

followed. The Emperor met them with bent form, a 
heavily-lined, distressed face, and the dazed air of a 
man who had received a shock which would carry hira 
into his grave. The Crown Princess standing by his 
side was unable to control herself, and sobbed bitterly. 
Count d'Eu alone seemed to have his wits about him. 
Through the intervention of his steward the financial 
embarrassments of the Emperor were made known as 
an excuse for deferring his departure. From the state- 
ment furnished by the steward it appeared that 2,000,000 
milreis would be needed at once. The Minister of 
Finance promptly issued a decree granting 5,000,000 
milreis in one payment, in addition to his regular allow- 
ances from the civil list amounting to -f 400,000 a year. 
The bargain was closed. The Emperor and the Crown 
Princess consented to sail for Europe on the next day 
with their families. So ended the second of the Three 
Glorious Days. 

The Orleans prince probably took great credit on 
that night for his practical ability in saving $2,500,000 
out of the wreck of the imperial fortunes. He called in 
his steward and virtually sold out the reigning family's 
stock in trade. It was a shrewd stroke of business on his 
side ; but when all the circumstances were considered, the 
main credit for making a good bargain could be taken 
by the revolutionary leaders. They were in a critical 
position. They controlled the garrison of the national 
capital, the treasury, and all the public offices ; and in 
Sao Paulo and several other provinces provisional gov- 
ernments had been promptly organized; but in Rio 
Grande do Sul there were indications of disturbance, 
and it had been necessary to order the arrest of the 
most powerful leader of the province. Senator Silveira 



-m 



ft 



.id 



KIO'S THREE GLORIOUS DAYS 33 

Martins; and at Bahia, the ecclesiastical centre of the 
country, the revolutionary movement had been strenu- 
ously opposed. The temper of the northern and interior 
provinces was luiknown. It was a matter of urgent 
necessity that the Emperor and his family should be 
taken out of the country with the least possible delay. 
If this could be done the battle of the Republic would 
be won without a struggle. If the imperial family were 
to remain in Brazil, the revolution might end in civil 
war. By the payment of $2,500,000 the Provisional 
Government secured the immediate adhesion of all the 
provinces. By producing evidence that the imperial 
family had sold out their rights and were ready to leave 
the country they convinced all classes that the Republic 
was the only form of government which was practical 
or even possible in Brazil. It was a master stroke of 
policy. 

During the forenoon of the third day it was generally 
known that the imperial family had been conducted 
soon after midnight to a gunboat, and had been trans- 
ferred subsequently to a steam packet bound for Lisbon. 
By their departure the population of the capital was 
relieved at once from dread of reactionary intrigue and 
civil war. The equivalent in hard cash paid for the 
vacation of the throne conciliated all classes with whom 
the Emperor had been popular, since it was a signal 
proof that he had not been turned adrift like a beggar 
after a long reign, but had been dealt with generously, 
and had been pensioned at the rate of $400,000 a year 
for the remainder of his life. At the same time it con- 
vinced them that monarchy was at an end and that a 
republic was a necessity. But the Emperor and Count 
d'Eu when they reached Lisbon, after an uneventful 



34 TEOPICAL AMERICA 

voyage, repented of the bargain which had made the 
political fortunes of the revolutionists. They were 
convinced by their advisers that they had blundered in 
accepting a financial settlement which compromised 
their claims to the throne. When it was too late they 
repudiated the bargain, and subjected themselves to a 
retaliatory decree from the Provisional Government 
annulling the settlement, although the constitution sub- 
sequently provided for the payment of an annual pen- 
sion to the Emperor. The revolutionary leaders derived 
all the advantages of magnanimous treatment of the 
imperial family without being forced in the end to pay 
the costs. The revolution ended on the third day with 
the departure of the royal exiles. The Prime Minister, 
Count Ouro Preto, was arrested a second time for vio- 
lating his parole, but was allowed to leave the country. 
A decree of banishment was subsequently enforced 
against Senator Silveira Martins and a brother of 
Count Ouro Preto. These were the only proscriptions 
involved by a revolution conspicuous for the facility 
with which momentous changes were effected. 

The revolution as a military event was one of the 
most grotesque in history. A few battalions which had 
been ordered to a remote province overturned the 
Empire. They were young, inexperienced, ill-disci- 
plined soldiers, who had never had experience in field 
evolutions. They were raw and untrustworthy troops, 
and overthrew the Empire withoiit bloodshed and 
almost without a struggle. The new government was 
established in a few hours ; and within three days the 
provincial administrations were revolutionized all along 
the coast. By a few strokes of the pen all the legisla- 
tive bodies in Brazil were abolished. All the institu- 



bio's three glorious days 35 

tions of the Empire were swept away. The Provisional 
Government and twenty subordinate revolutionary ad- 
ministrations in the provinces were established as a sub- 
stitute for everything that had previously existed under 
constitutional warrants. The Ministers began to issue 
decrees at a rate that made men's heads reel. The 
French Revolution in its most paroxysmal periods never 
witnessed activity equal to that of these new decree- 
makers. Naturalization, the franchise, civil marriage, a 
constitutional commission, and a hundred other matters 
of the gravest importance were settled off-hand by a 
revolutionary commission created by a few battalions of 
soldiers. The country acquiesced in all these arrange- 
ments with an apathy and an indifference never paral- 
leled in history. The accomplished editor of the Rio 
Neivs told the truth when he said to me that the Bra- 
zilians threw off the Empire as easily as they would 
have changed their coats. 

The influence of the military officers was felt 
wherever the tidings of the revolution at Rio de Ja- 
neiro were received. There was a smaller Deodoro in 
every provincial capital, ready to act promptly and to 
take the initiative in transferring power from the im- 
perial authorities to new hands, precisely as the greater 
Deodoro had done in the national capital. A coalition 
of insubordinate army officers and inexperienced con- 
stitution-makers would have been impracticable if the 
leaders had not known that the twenty provinces of the 
Empire were profoundly disaffected, and would regard 
with apathy the downfall of the Empire. Tliis fact lies 
at the base of any adequate explanation of the rev- 
olution. The Military Club was a power in the capital; 
the Republican organizers had made progress in the more 



36 TROPICAL AINIERICA 

enlightened and enterprising provinces like Sao Paulo ; 
but the revolutionists would not have undertaken the 
political reorganization of Brazil if there had not been 
in every quarter of the sky signs of revolt against a des- 
potic system of centralized administration. It was in 
this direction that every intelligent Brazilian whom I 
met never failed to point, when asked to explain the 
chief cause of the revolution. 

Ruy Barbosa, Minister of Finance, in the course of 
frank conversations with me in Rio de Janeiro, strongly 
supported this view. He said that the most prominent 
ground of dissatisfaction with the Empire was central- 
ization, with the absence of any real federal system. 
The people of Brazil had gradually lost all interest in 
the Empire. The Emperor might have had amiable 
intentions, but the system of administration was thor- 
oughly corrupt and incompetent. The provinces had no 
rights as members of a confederation of states. They 
longed for autonomy in local administration. The 
Emperor had grown old, his mind had failed him, and 
he was suffering from an incurable disease. In his 
dotage, the Princess Isabel was the real head of the 
State. Surrounded by Jesuits, she had no will of her 
own. Priests were always about her, and clericalism 
was threatening to become a direct menace to Brazilian 
liberty. The Empire had served its purpose, and was 
out of date. It retarded national progress. It was ab- 
solutely necessary to assimilate the institutions of the 
country with those of the liberal and progressive repub- 
lics on the American continent. Every thoughtful 
Brazilian had been conscious that the revolution was 
imminent. The military revolt would have failed if the 
country had not been gradually preparing for a change 



EIO'S THREE GLORIOUS DAYS 37 

of political order. The revolution was a startling sur- 
prise to those who were not familiar with the conditions 
of public thought ; but all intelligent citizens had for a 
long time accepted it as a foregone conclusion. When 
the military forces set the patriotic example of declaring 
for the Republic, the people in all the provinces acqui- 
esced in the movement with a unanimity that armed 
the Provisional Government with absolute authority. 
It was in its earliest aspect a military revolt, but the 
hearty support of all classes of Brazilians in all the 
provinces converted it at once into an irresistible 
national movement. 

A leader of the revolution was not perhaps capable of 
forming an impartial estimate of the civic virtues of a 
sovereign who had enjoyed the reputation of being one 
of the most enlightened rulers of his time. Dom Pedro 
II. was a ruler with many fine qualities and estimable 
traits, who endeared himself to his subjects. He was 
not a constitutional reformer. The charter which he 
had received from his father was not modified in any 
essential respect during his long reign. It was a charter 
under which his father, after establishing the inde- 
pendence of Brazil, had sought to create a despotism. 
The father went into exile after a ten years' struggle 
against the aspirations of the provinces for home rule. 
The son followed him into banishment, after a long 
reign, during which the same tendencies of the federal 
provinces were systematically repressed. The govern- 
ors or presidents were not elected by the people of the 
provinces, but were appointed by the Emperor, together 
with the military commandants. One of the standing 
evils against which the provinces ineffectually protested 
was the appointment either of adventurers who were 



38 TROPICAL AMERICA 

unfamiliar with the local requirements and interests, or 
of political partisans sent out from the national capital 
to promote the selfish interests of the party in power. 

Throughout the closing years of the Emperor's reign it 
was an unfailing source of irritation and complaint that 
the provinces were governed, not for their own interests, 
but for those of the imperial administration. The main 
object seemed to be to get out of them as much money 
as possible for the national treasury and to leave little, 
if anything, for local requirements. The provinces were 
so many cows to be milked for the imperial dairy. Local 
government in any real sense they did not have. The 
legislatures meeting two months in the year exercised 
limited functions and were powerless to interfere with 
the military proconsuls. Every branch of the govern- 
ment was under pressure from an imperial system re- 
sembling the complex mechanism which Metternich 
established and controlled in Vienna, until it broke 
down under its own weight. Each party in turn was 
employed to operate the system, the Emperor pitting 
the Liberals against the Conservatives for no other ap- 
parent purpose than that of maintaining his own personal 
ascendency over both. Ministers became groups of pro- 
fessional office-holders and patronage-mongers, whose 
political opinions could with difficulty be differentiated. 

A Liberal ministry was, if anything, less progressive 
in its tendency and more obsequious in its attitude to 
the throne than a Conservative ministry. The Emperor 
regarded the two groups of political rivals as alternating 
machines, fitting into and working with the imperial 
mechanism; and the governors of the provinces were 
twenty connecting cog-wheels kept in motion by the 
ministerial apparatus. Emerson once said of the Eng- 



KIO'S THREE GLORIOUS DAYS 39 

lish, " Their god is Precedent." Dom Pedro's god was 
Centralization. The provinces only needed evidence 
that a government competent to maintain public order 
and to repress anarchy had been formed. Disaffected 
and out of sympathy with a system that deprived them 
of the normal functions of self-government, they offered 
no resistance to the establishment of the Republic with 
its promise of larger liberties for the confederated States. 
The revolution seemed to them a supreme act of political 
emancipation. 

There were other grounds for dissatisfaction with 
monarchical institutions. Emancipation had created 
wide-spread disaffection among planters and land-owners 
and weakened the authority of the imperial govern- 
ment. The slave-holders had not been prepared for 
emancipation when it was decreed without warning by 
the Princess-Regent. They were taken by surprise 
and forced to adapt themselves to the conditions of 
free labor and to face the vicissitudes of a transition 
period which had been fatal to British planters in the 
West Indies. They had been the most loyal supporters 
of the crown, and they felt that their interests had 
been wantonly sacrificed. The Princess-Regent when 
she signed the Emancipation Proclamation left the 
slave-owners to shift for themselves. In the crisis of 
the revolution the planters and land-holders left the 
imperial family to shift for themselves. There were 
no signs of resistance in the agricultural provinces of 
Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo and Minas Geraes, where 
more than one-half of the slaves had been owned. The 
planters who had controlled the government of the 
Empire for half a century witnessed with apathy and 
cynical indifference the establishment of a republic by 



40 TROPICAL AMERICA 

a military cabal. The imperial dynasty had abandoned 
them to their fate. It was a game at which two could 
play. 

If the planters were disaffected, so also were Brazil- 
ians in general. They knew that they had all the 
conditions required for making a rich and prosperous 
nation. What was needed was European immigration 
on a large scale, and they had failed in all their efforts 
to attract it by colonization schemes and bounties. 
While the Plate countries were a powerful magnet for 
drawing Europeans to the New World, and their com- 
merce was expanding with phenomenal rapidity, Brazil 
seemed to exercise a repellent force, and remained 
stationary. There was a general conviction that prog- 
ress in material wealth was retarded by monarchical 
institutions. All educated men were looking for the 
establishment of a republic after the close of the reign 
of Dom Pedro II. When the change of government 
came without bloodshed and almost without a struggle, 
bringing emancipation from the evils of centralization 
and the reactionary intrigues of clericalism, they were 
momentarily startled and then overjoyed by the facility 
with which the Empire had been overthrown. The 
Princess-Regent if she had become Empress would have 
made a determined fight for the throne. Civil war had 
been averted by a well-timed revolution. Brazil under 
republican order would cease to repel immigration. An 
era of industrial progress would at once be opened. The 
United States of Brazil would be destined to rival the 
United States of America in wealth and population as 
they already did in territory and natural resources. 
This was the tone of public thought during the tranquil 
weeks which followed the revolution at Rio de Janeiro. 



EIO'S THREE GLORIOUS DAYS 41 

The apathy of the people was the most astounding 
feature of the revolution. On the day after my arrival, 
a decree was issued which practically established martial 
law throughout the country. There had been a trivial 
mutiny a few days before among some drunken soldiers, 
and owing to the absence of commissioned officers the 
imperial flag had been raised. It was a ridiculous 
affair, but it thoroughly alarmed the government. On 
the strength of that mutiny martial law was proclaimed. 
A military commission was appointed to investigate the 
affair, and eleven suspects were examined, nine of them 
being set at liberty. A decree was proclaimed investing 
the commission with the powers and functions of a 
military court. An elastic list of political offences, begin- 
ning with conspiracy against the Republic and incite- 
ment to military mutiny and ending with speaking and 
writing against the existing order of government, was 
made up, and all civil processes were suspended in such 
cases. The commission was empowered to take cog- 
nizance of all such offences, and to try suspected per- 
sons by martial law. The decree was applied to the 
whole country. The proprietors of the only Opposition 
journal at once sought an interview with the Ministers, 
and according to their own version were informed that 
the decree applied to press offences. They suspended 
the publication of their journal. Free speech had been 
one of the political rights guaranteed by the imperial 
constitution. Republican editors had enjoyed immu- 
nity from press laws, and if their rights had been 
denied, a revolution would have been precipitated. The 
principles of a free press were compromised by a decree 
which made it dangerous for any one to speak ill or 
to write critically of the Republican government, but 



42 TROPICAL AMERICA 

nothing came of it. Apathy reigned. Martial law was 
complacently regarded as a necessary evil. Each after- 
noon new decrees were read in the newspapers and then 
cigarettes were puffed and the favorable weather was 
discussed. I found myself wondering whether a decree 
formulating a new Decalogue would make much stir. 

It was this condition of public apathy which ex- 
plained the strange proceedings of the Three Glorious 
Days. The x^eople submitted to the overthrow of the 
Empire because they had ceased to care anything about 
it. They attributed the backwardness of their own 
country to the form of government. They disliked 
centralization, clericalism, and other tendencies of im- 
perial rule. They wanted a change, and so when the 
Empire went down like a child's sand palace, they were 
indifferent to its fate. The new government came in 
with its highly improved mechanism for grinding out 
decrees like stock quotations on a ticker; and the 
people looked on with languid indifference. Govern- 
ment by self-organized military commissions was insti- 
tuted, but nobody seemed to take any interest in it. 
Martial law was proclaimed, and there was no excitement. 
If Brazilians had any serious thought in tliis w^hole 
matter, it was the reflection that the country needed a 
thorough shaking up, and w^as getting it. 

I thought of these things on the last day of 1889, 
when the bells rang out the year of Republican jubilee. 
The streets of Rio de Janeiro were thronged with a 
joyous populace. Military bands in open street cars 
were entertaining the holiday crowds with snatches of 
French music ; army officers were conspicuous in the 
streets, with an air of importance betokening conscious- 
ness of their success in making history hand over hand, 



EIO'S THREE GLORIOUS DAYS 43 

and of their ability to undo their work and to restore 
the Empire at any hour. Lottery-ticket vendors swarmed 
in the Passeio Publico and plied a brisk trade. To 
drink a strong native brew, to listen to a noisy military 
band, and to attend the official readings from a lottery 
wheel, complete a Brazilian's holiday recreation. I 
watched a motley throng gathered about a lottery 
stand, and fancied that I understood the feeling of 
apathy and frivolity with which the downfall of the 
Empire and the establishment of a provisional govern- 
ment had been received. Lottery gambling had for 
many years been a passion ; the Church had sanctioned 
it as a legitimate means of raising money for hospitals 
and religious purposes. Many of the finest churches in 
the capital had been built in that way. If the sanitary 
condition of a town was to be improved, a statue 
erected, or a burdensome floating debt paid off, a lottery 
was brought in as a popular expedient. The Brazilians 
seemed to be infatuated with a frenzy for taking chances 
in these gambling wheels, and were constantly drawing 
their money out of savings banks to fling away in the 
excitement of a lottery. The revolution burst upon a 
people who were accustomed to the philosophy of blanks 
and prizes. General Deodoro won the first prize ; the 
Emperor and his family drew blanks. The ministers of 
the day, who had never been in public life, carried off a 
series of second prizes. The people had in the Republic 
something that might prove either a blank or a prize, 
they knew not which, but it was a great lottery, and 
they had all drawn their numbers and must wait and 
watch their luck. 



Ill 

PETROPOLIS WITHOUT AN EMPEROR 

journey to the brazilian catskills christmas in 

a lovely valley a palace closed and sealed 

a shabby-genteel court departure op the 

imperial exiles — clericalism at court the 

empress's death 

The Brazilian Catskills are only twenty-five miles 
from the steaming pavements and polluted harbor of 
Rio de Janeiro. A steamer leaves the Prainha every 
afternoon during the summer months. When I went 
with a party of Americans to the mountains on the day 
before Christmas, the deck was crowded with diplomats, 
politicians, and business men, .whose homes were in 
Petropolis. I sat near the Minister of Justice, Campos 
Salles, whose strong, thoughtful, and benevolent face 
showed no signs of the political anxieties of the revo- 
lutionary epoch. He read a newspaper quietly and 
seemed to take politics less seriously than the throngs 
gathered around him. If they had been with him in 
the innermost circle and had come from a cabinet meet- 
ing at which a decree of martial law was proclaimed, 
they would have known more and have said less ; but 
they were outside, and at liberty to discuss the rumors 
of the day with pantomime of frantic gesture and 
unceasing play of facial expression. 
44 



PETROPOLIS WITHOUT AN EMPEROR 45 

Introductions followed rapidly, and before the steamer 
started I had received several accounts from eye-wit- 
nesses of the bloodless revolution. Foreign residents 
spoke with cynical contempt of the battalions which had 
overthrown the dynasty. A former New Yorker told 
me that a single squad of Broadway police could have 
saved the throne. Another American undertook to 
explain why the revolution had been a bloodless one. A 
new military rifle had been introduced and the old stock 
of ammunition could not be used with it. Before the 
troops could be supplied with new cartridges they were 
ordered to a remote province. They rebelled and over- 
threw the Empire, but while they were surrounding the 
government buildings and parading in the Ouvidor they 
could not fire a shot. This recital seemed incredible, 
but it was hardly more grotesque than the facility with 
which the Republic was established by a few battalions 
of young, inexperienced, and ill-disciplined soldiers. 
An English acquaintance told me how the first news of 
the revolution reached Europe. He was in the street, 
and saw the troops blocking the entrance to the govern- 
ment offices. He waited until he heard an excited 
crowd shouting for a republic, and then ran to a cable 
office and sent a despatch to London announcing that 
the government had been overthrown and that a 
republic was about to be proclaimed. Five minutes 
afterward the cable office was in the possession of the 
revolutionists and communication with the world was 
broken off. 

There was a long interval of inexplicable delay at the 
wharf, procrastination being regarded in Brazil, not as 
the thief, but as the custodian, of time, and then the 
steamer was headed toward the majestic Organ Moun- 



46 TROPICAL AMERICA 

tains. The old Benedictine monastery loomed up on 
the right with the ship-3'^ards of the Marine Hospital 
below it, while on the left were the main coffee store- 
houses, with a dry dock close at hand, which was one 
of the most curious things to be seen in the city. It 
was a huge basin chiselled and hollowed out of solid 
rock by convict labor, — a public work wrought by 
Egyptian methods in this modern age. The city lying 
like an encampment, with its line of grim hillsides 
posted as sentinels from the water's edge at Castello 
and Gloria to the outermost suburbs, slowly receded 
from view. The waters of the upper bay, studded with 
islands, opened vistas of enchanting loveliness. It was 
an hour's sail of unrivalled beauty. The massive ram- 
parts of the Organ Mountains were still ten miles away 
when the steamer approached the landing. A train of 
small open cars was waiting to carry the passengers to 
the base of the mountains, over the oldest railway in 
Brazil. It was a dull, noisy ride through low, swampy 
lands until the foot of the range was reached. Then 
for four miles there were precipitous grades with mag- 
nificent prospects of harbor and town, and flashing 
glimpses of foaming brooks, and the old carriage road. 
The train was separated into sections and operated on 
the Riggenbach system. In the course of half an hour 
an altitude of 2800 feet was reached, with a viaduct 200 
feet long near the summit. This section of the railway 
is new, and it is a remarkably good engineering work. 
It is a journey of unceasing variety and delight. The 
scenic transformations of the mountains surpass even 
the wonderful panoramic effects of the harbor. 

Petropolis lies in a valley of the Serra da Estrella 
among the Organ Mountains. It is 2700 feet above the 



PETROPOLIS WITHOUT AN EMPEROR 47 

sea and revels in an invigorating climate. Yellow Jack 
has never flaunted his flag there. It is a secure refuge 
even when pestilence is raging in the panic-stricken 
capital. As a summer residence it is unrivalled in 
Brazil. It has comfortable German hotels, tasteful 
houses, well-kept lawns, luxuriant gardens, delightful 
drives and scenery unsurpassed elsewhere in Brazil. 
The valley is encompassed with mountain peaks which 
can be easily scaled by roadway or path. In one of the 
gorges there is a picturesque cascade. Through another 
winds the old turnpike to an outlying town in Minas 
Geraes. The valley is traversed by brooks which are 
spanned by substantial iron bridges at the roadway 
crossings. The shops are cluttered together, and the 
residences are irregularly grouped with a background 
of well-kept gardens. There is a normal population of 
12,000 in this valley of delight, but it is materially 
increased during the summer months. There are 8000 
Germans in the town, mainly descendants of the colony 
planted on the imperial estates nearly flfty years ago. 
Evidences of their thrift and orderliness abound. Pe- 
tropolis is a suburban resort that steadily grows in 
attractiveness while the traveller lingers in it. The 
gardens are its chief ornament, and in their tropical 
bloom it is radiant in color the year round. The roads 
are equally good for driving or riding, and the rugged 
mountains with their peaceful summits are always beau- 
tiful. One may well believe that the Emperor often 
sighed wearily, during two years of exile, for a glimpse 
of this lovely valley, endeared to him by the associa- 
tions of a lifetime. How often must thoughts of his 
favorite trees and flowers and of the retirement of his 
library and the shaded seats in his beautiful park have 



48 TKOPICAL AMERICA 

come back to him in his melancholy hours like light 
from the west at eventime ! Petropolis faded out of 
his sight forever on that gloomy and confused morning 
when he hastened to Rio de Janeiro, as he supposed, to 
form a new ministry and to get rid of two or thi-ee 
unpopular leaders, but in reality to sell out his throne, 
and then repenting of his bargain, to get nothing for it 
but exile and bitter memories. 

Petropolis is the city of the Pedroes, under whose pat- 
ronage it has been steadily improved and adorned. Dom 
Pedro I. was attracted by his first glimpse of the valley 
in 1822, and induced to buy a large tract which remained 
unoccupied and undeveloped until 1843. Then the Ger- 
man colony was brought in, and Dom Pedro II. began to 
take an active interest in the estate. The palace was 
built, the first section of the railway was laid, a good 
road was opened to the foot of the range, parks were 
reserved, and Petropolis was created. All the associa- 
tions of the town centred around the imperial family, 
who loved the place and were not content to live any- 
where else. My first stroll on Christmas morning natu- 
rally led to the palace in the centre of a spacious park. 
The gates were open, and a winding road, fringed with 
beds of roses and shaded by noble trees, brought me to 
the main entrance. It was a large square house with 
two stories in the centre and two long wings of a single 
tier of windows. It was a plain structure of brick and 
plaster, painted yellow and white. It was a homely 
palace with an air of frugal comfort and an utter absence 
of display. In it the Emperor lived like a retired country 
gentleman of bookish tastes, cherishing his flowers and 
trees, and, with a pedantry characteristic of him, trans- 
lating Spanish books into Portuguese, and exhausting in 



PETEOPOLIS WITHOUT AN EMPEROR 49 

achievements of petty scholarship energies which ought 
to have been employed in working out the political and 
social problems of Brazil. It was always an unsocial 
house. The Emperor never entertained ministers or 
friends. A new representative of a foreign government 
was admitted to a brief formal audience and was curtly 
bowed out, never to be invited again. There were neither 
court revels nor stately banquets in those gloomy and ill- 
furnished halls. The Emperor did not care for any of 
these things. He and his family lived there with extreme 
plainness, — almost meanly. No other monarch of the 
first rank had so frugal a table, or employed so few 
servants, or made less show of his dignity and power. 
The equipment of the place was in keeping with these 
conditions of simplicity and retirement. The stables 
were small, for the Emperor was accustomed to drive 
behind a mule team in a shabby barouche. The servants' 
quarters were bare and cheerless. The park, with its 
rare shrubbery and its wealth of flowers, alone showed 
signs of disregard of cheese-paring economy. 

The stables and the servants' lodgings were empty on 
that Christmas morning. The great doors at the sides 
and ends of the palace were ostentatiously sealed with a 
superscription indicating the date, November 18, 1889, 
and the police authority by which the imperial house was 
closed. The curtains and shades were drawn down with 
unbroken regularity. The shabby furniture was still 
there, and the wardrobes and libraries were stocked 
almost as they were on the morning when the summons 
to exile was received. The palace and grounds had 
virtually been confiscated. The imperial family were 
allowed two years in which to dispose of their property, 
but by decree of December 20, 1889, they were banished 



60 TROPICAL AMERICA 

from Brazil and forbidden to own real estate within its 
borders. This was the penalty imposed for the Emperor's 
refusal to hold to the bargain by which he sold out his 
throne. The palace was looked upon as State property. 
I heard men calmly discussing the practicability of form- 
ing a stock company, purchasing the palace, filling up 
the park with cottages, and working up what Americans 
would call a real estate boom for the town. So soon 
passes away the glory of royalty. 

Not far from the palace was the mansion formerly 
occupied by Princess Isabel and Count d'Eu. It too 
had been called a palace, but it was an unpretentious 
villa, large enough perhaps for the Orleans conception 
of prudent magnificence, but too small and plain to be 
worthy of the dignity once accorded to it. Near by was 
the crystal palace, built by the Princess for flower shows, 
but seldom used for any purpose. It was originally 
fashioned of glass, but was subsequently framed with 
iron at the sides for protection against rain. In front 
of it was a tall cross, formed by vines planted by the 
Princess's hand. No obtrusive hand had touched the 
cross, but the crystal palace, with its park, was in the 
market ready to be knocked down to the highest bidder. 
The Princess's mansion would also be sold to the first 
comer willing to pay well for it. The unfinished church 
near the Emperor's palace was also to be put on the 
market. This was the structure for which decorations 
and titles were peddled a few years ago. It was to have 
been a noble monument to the Catholic faith, and any- 
one who offered a fair subscription to the building fund 
was compensated with a title, or decoration of some 
kind. So great a scandal was caused that the work was 
suspended, although the Princess had set her heart upon 



PBTEOPOLIS WITHOUT AN EMPEROR 51 

its completion. As I passed the unfinislied church in 
my morning stroll, I was gravely informed by a resident 
of the town that there was talk of altering the design 
and converting the structure into a casino. 

An American living in Brazil gave me a curious 
account of the Emperor's last visit to the rich province 
of Sao Paulo. Touched by the signs of popular affec- 
tion, the aged sovereign was led, in the course of a con- 
fidential talk with one of his entertainers, to contrast 
his own popularity with the coldness and indifference 
shown to other members of his household. "I shall 
reign as long as I live," he exclaimed, "for the Brazil- 
ians know me. My daughter, perhaps. My grand- 
children, I don't know." This forecast of the fortunes 
of the dynasty was one of many indications that the 
Emperor, while he did not expect to lose his throne in 
his old age, clearly discerned the approaching revolu- 
tion and the inevitable establishment of a republican 
form of government. What he did not perceive was 
the superior facility with which revolutionists could 
accomplish their purposes while he was on the throne. 
If they had waited until he was in his grave, they 
would have had a determined Empress, with all the 
resources of the Church to deal with. 

The revolution was a popular revolt not only against 
centralization but also against clericalism. The Crown 
Princess combined the rugged, robust traits of the Empe- 
ror's character with the Neapolitan religious nature of 
her mother, daughter of the king of the Two Sicilies. 
Resolute, ambitious, and naturally fond of the business 
of state, she had a passion for managing and overreach- 
ing politicians, and at the same time she was a religious 
zealot easily controlled by spiritual advisers. The vigor, 



52 TROPICAL AMERICA 

inflexible purpose, and self-reliance which she displayed 
under the Regency were qualities which convinced 
thoughtful Brazilians that Dom Pedro's successor would 
not be a weak and incapable sovereign. The decree 
of emancipation signed by her during her father's ab- 
sence in Europe was an earnest of the force of charac- 
ter which she would disclose upon ascending the throne. 
With this masculine vigor was coupled piety of a femi- 
nine type. When Louis Philippe was affecting Vol- 
tairean ideas, Queen Marie Amelie was scrupulously 
exact in. her devotions and attendance at mass, and 
could be seen on Sundays handing about collection- 
bags in her parish church. The Crown Princess, too, 
was a pious and devoted daughter of the Church. Early 
in life she was brought under the influence of religious 
advisers, who convinced her that she had even greater 
duties to perform for the Church than for the Empire. 
As time went on, their ascendency over her mind was 
completely established. As Queen Marie Amelie had 
humbled herself, so she was wont to subject herself to 
degrading discipline. A Brazilian told me of the pain- 
ful sensation created in Rio de Janeiro when it became 
known one day that the future Empress had taken a 
broom and swept out the aisles of a church as an act 
of penance. This incident, if the details were not ex- 
aggerated, disclosed the absolute dominion which cleri- 
cal advisers had obtained over her. 

Other evidence was not wanting. The Emancipation 
Act was known to have been the work of the Jesuits 
rather than the ministers of the day. The Princess- 
Regent's religious guides, knowing that she and her 
husband were unpopular, perceived the advantage of 
obtaining for her the credit of liberating 1,600,000 slaves. 



PETKOPOLIS WITHOUT AN EMPEROR 63 

The Ministry, being aware of the financial embarrass- 
ment and ruin that would be caused if slave-owners 
were taken unawares, desired to defer the proclamation 
at least until the Emperor's return. The Princess- 
Regent preferred to act upon the counsel of the Cleri- 
calists. It was a great stroke of state, designed to con- 
ciliate public opinion and to endear the future sovereign 
to the hearts of the people. The popular rejoicings 
were tumultuous at the time ; but the slave-owners were 
thrown into a sullen, resentful temper, which subse- 
quently led them to recognize in the revolution an act 
of retribution ; and the sober second thought of the 
people was tinged with apprehension, caused by so un- 
mistakable a revelation of the domination of clericalism 
at court. 

It was not long before another demonstration of cleri- 
cal influence was made. A measure providing for the 
full degree of religious equality and toleration guaran- 
teed by the imperial constitution was introduced and 
passed by the Senate. As that body was ultra-conserva- 
tive, and recruited mainly from the circle of imperial 
partisans, its action in promptly passing the bill created 
general astonishment, and the concurrence of the lower 
Chamber was taken as a matter of course. The Crown 
Princess, instigated by her advisers, at once busied her- 
self in obstructing the measure and preventing its enact- 
ment. She went from house to house, obtaining signa- 
tures to a popular protest against the passage of the 
Religious Liberty Act. Her husband and many court 
ladies assisted her in the work, and before many days 
the remonstrance had been signed by over 14,000 women. 
The country was dazed by this remarkable exhibition 
of religious bigotry. It served the immediate purpose 



54 TROPICAL AMERICA 

of defeating the measure, with the adventitious aid of 
a group of obstructionists ; but it also furnished over- 
whehning evidence of the ascendency which clerical 
intriguers would have in the councils of the next reign. 
Roman Catholicism was the established religion of the 
State ; but the Brazilians were a free people, jealous of 
private liberties, and disposed, like Gambetta, to cry 
out, " Clericalism is the enemy." 

The Crown Princess's headstrong and capricious im- 
pulses were strengthened rather than controlled by her 
French husband, who, in the popular estimation, was 
held responsible for most of her mistakes and errors of 
judgment. Count d'Eu had the fatal Orleans gift of 
incurring unpopularity. From his first appearance in 
Brazil he had been regarded as a foreigner Avho was 
accumulating a fortune at the expense of the natives. 
He was a landowner with a large rent-roll, invested 
his money well, and kept the bulk of his fortune in 
Europe. There was no more effective method of 
impairing his popularity among the masses in Brazil 
than that offered by the exercise of ordinary business 
prudence, for which the Orleans princes have been con- 
spicuous generation after generation. 

Petropolis was dazed for a few hours on that eventful 
November morning when the shabby state -coach was 
driven to the station to meet a special train for the 
capital; but when the tidings came that the imperial 
family had sailed, and that the palaces were to be 
closed, there was a reversion to more cheerful views of 
the future of the town. Men told me soberly that 
Petropolis would make rapid strides in wealth and 
progress, now that the incubus of the vojal family had 
been lifted off. Hundreds of new houses and cottages 



PETROPOLIS WITHOUT AN EiVIPEKOE, 55 

would speedily be built, and all the conditions of a met- 
ropolitan watering-place would be supplied. There 
would be a music hall, a casino, new hotels, and 
building enterprises on a large scale. A powerful 
impulse would be imparted to the fortunes of the 
town by the imperial clearance. I heard a resident 
talking in this vein for an hour, almost lamenting that 
he lacked surplus capital required for investments. 
Such is the way of the world when the occupation of 
princes has gone. 

The diplomatists of the mountain valley were pre- 
paring to attend a reception at the town house of Count 
d'Eu when they received the startling tidings of the 
overthrow of the Empire. Invitations had been sent 
for the evening of the 16th of November, and the minis- 
ters representing foreign governments were expecting 
to enjoy these unwonted festivities. The reception was 
indefinitely postponed. The Emperor was virtually a 
prisoner in his dismal town palace. Princess Isabel 
was preparing for her European journey. Count d'Eu 
was meditating over the fantastic blunder of resigning 
his military commission in terms which practically rec- 
ognized the authority of the Provisional Government. 
The ministers, instead of enjoying the hospitality of 
the imperial house, were consulting hastily together 
over the catastrophe that had befallen the court to 
which they were accredited. They were dazed and 
bewildered by a revolution without a parallel in history 
for the feebleness of the means employed for accom- 
plishing momentous results and the powerlessness of a 
throne to protect itself. 

Pathetic, indeed, was the story which was told in Rio 
de Janeiro of the Emperor's departure. It had been 



56 TROPICAL AMERICA 

arranged that he should leave the city late at night so 
as to avoid the risks of popular reaction and excitement. 
Only a few hours had been allowed for the preparations 
for the journey. The physician and several ladies had 
already gone out to a gunboat in the customs barge. 
The officer who was to conduct the Emperor, the Crown 
Princess, and Count d'Eu to the landing drove up to 
the palace. The Emperor met him with exclamations 
betokening a mind disordered with grief. " I had hoped 
to die in Brazil. What have I done to merit this? 
What crimes have my family committed ? I tell you, 
officer, we are all fools, — you and I and everybody ! 
We do not know what we are about. We understand 
nothing, — except that Brazil is dear to us ! " With 
such disjointed exclamations and many sobs and groans, 
the Emperor went down to the landing and stepped for 
the last time on Brazilian soil. His daughter also 
asked, with choking voice, what she, or her father, or 
her husband had done that they should be bundled 
off ignominiously, and not even allowed time to get 
together their travelling wraps. Count d'Eu alone 
retained self-control, and busied himself in calming the 
court ladies who were accompanying the royal fugitives. 
There was only a small group of bystanders at the land- 
ing as they embarked on a small steam launch. It Avas 
three o'clock in the morning, and the lights of the city 
were burning low. The launch conveyed them to a 
gunboat, which lay at anchor in the harbor. At ten 
o'clock the gunboat went out to meet the packet Ala- 
gSas, which had been chartered to take the royal exiles 
to Lisbon. The ironclad RiacTiuelo accompanied the 
steamer to Cape Frio. That rocky headland was the 
unhappy monarch's last glimpse of his dearly loved 
country. 



PETROPOLIS WITHOUT AN EMPEROR 57 

One Sunday during my stay in Rio de Janeiro the 
news of the death of the Empress was received. It did 
not raise a ripple of excitement in the Ouvidor. The 
newsboys hardly made use of the announcement in their 
outcries while hawking their papers. The Empress had 
been eminent for her domestic qualities and for her 
benefactions to deserving charities, and had been uni- 
versally respected. Her death aroused no feeling of 
public sympathy for the misfortunes of the imperial 
house. It made less impression than the extremely 
favorable mortality statistics for the week, showing only 
seven deaths from yellow fever. It was plain that the 
people of Brazil were done with monarchy for all time, 
and that everything relating to the imperial family 
would be regarded with the same feeling of apathy 
which had characterized the revolution at every stage. 



IV 

A NEW ERA IN BRAZIL 

AMERICAK PKECEDENTS FOLLOWED — AN EXLIGHTENED 
SCHEME OF CONSTITUTIONAL LAW DEODORO's DICTA- 
TORSHIP AND DOWNFALL DISESTABLISHMENT OF THE 

CHURCH — HOME RULE FINANCIAL DISORDERS A 

STRUGGLE FROM DARKNESS TO LIGHT 

The Provisional Government, whicli had been placed 
in power by the garrison of the capital, became, on 
November 15, 1889, the sole repository of political 
authority. In a single week the ground was cleared, 
and all the institutions of the Empire were swept 
away. It was centralized administration reduced to a 
system of extraordinary simplicity, but general apathy 
prevailed, since it was known that a commission was 
embodying the decrees of the self-organized govern- 
ment in a constitution which would ultimately be sub- 
mitted to a national assembl}^ elected by the people. 
This commission of five constitution-makers was ap- 
pointed by the decree of December 3, 1889. It deliv- 
ered the text of the Constitution to the Pro^asional 
Government on May 30, 1890. The Constitution was 
proclaimed on June 22, 1890, but was declared to be in 
force only so far as it related to the election, on Sep- 
tember 15, of two houses of Congress, which were to be 
invested with the supreme function of revising and 
sanctioning it. 
58 



A NEW ERA IN BRAZIL 59 

Although the French was the only literature with 
which the educated classes were conversant, Washing- 
ton rather than Paris was the source from which the 
Brazilian law-makers derived their inspiration. The 
sharpest possible departure from French procedure is . 
the adoption of the American type of presidential, 
as distinguished from cabinet government. The ad- 
ministration is not left dependent upon legislative 
divisions ; there is no premiership, and cabinet minis- 
ters retain their portfolios at the discretion of the 
Executive. In France, the deputies aspire to give 
direction to the administrative impulses as well as to 
the legislative functions of the nation. In Brazil, it is 
the executive administration, and not the national 
legislature, which is strengthened in all its functions. 
The President was elected in the first instance by the 
National Assembly, as in France ; but under the Consti- 
tution his successors will be chosen by popular election 
through the instrumentality of an electoral college. 
The Executive derives his authority from the nation, 
and is not responsible to Congress except when im- 
peached. With a complete separation of legislative and 
executive functions is combined the same system of 
checks and balances which has promoted stability and 
permanence in the United States. 

The most significant departures from the American 
plan are the lengthening of the official terms, the sub- 
stitution of educational for universal suffrage, and the 
facility with which the Constitution may be amended. 
The President's term is six years and he cannot be 
re-elected; a senator's is nine years, and a representa- 
tive's is three years. These are changes for the better, 
since the excitement and turmoil of elections are ren- 



60 TROPICAL AMERICA 

dered less frequent. The proportion of illiterate classes 
to the whole population is so large that it has been 
necessary to protect the state against ignorance. The 
electorate includes all men of the voting age, without 
distinctions of race or previous condition of servitude, 
who can read and write. While educational suffrage 
marks a distinct advance upon universal suffrage, the 
facility with which the Constitution may be amended 
involves a sacrifice of that principle of wholesome con- 
servatism which has contributed to the permanency of 
the American system. In Brazil the approval of the 
State legislatures is dispensed with when the Constitu- 
tion is revised. The legislatures may apply for and 
recommend changes in the organic law, but Congress is 
armed with supreme power to decide upon the pro- 
posals and may act independently of such initiative 
measures. French influence and example have pre- 
vailed in simplifying and expediting the process of 
constitutional change. 

Brazil had secured what was theoretically the best 
scheme of constitutional republicanism known in Tropi- 
cal America ; but a nation which has been misgoverned 
for generations was condemned to work out its salvation 
in fear and trembling. There was not a republic of 
Latin- American blood which had not made a rough copy 
of the American Constitution; and in every one of 
those States, after the patriotic revolt against Spain, 
powerful families, military dictators, and political cabals 
had usurped from time to time the supreme functions of 
democracy. Presidents, while prohibited from serving 
a second term, had either perpetuated their own power 
or had promoted the ambitious ends of ruling families 
by nominating their own successors, calling the military 



A NEW ERA IN BRAZIL 61 

garrisons of the capital to their aid and forcing Congress 
or the electoral colleges to ratify their decision. With 
the American Constitution as the common basis of 
republican government in Spanish America, travesties of 
political liberty and constitutional republicanism had 
been enacted and oligarchical and military rule had 
been the prevailing type. Brazil had entered upon the 
same struggle from darkness to light. 

From the opening of the National Assembly which 
had been elected on September 15, 1890, there were 
signs of an irreconcilable conflict between the President 
and the legislators. A large majority of the senators 
and deputies had been chosen under pressure exerted 
directly or indirectly by the Provisional Governments 
of Rio de Janeiro and the provincial capitals ; but when 
they assembled for the revision of the Constitution they 
were fully conscious of their power. Many of the trained 
servants of the imperial civil service, having made their 
peace with the revolutionary government, reappeared 
in public life, and from the floors of Congress displayed 
a determination to control the departments of adminis- 
tration. For several generations lawyers, journalists, 
and educated men, who were not planters, had con- 
sidered it necessary to earn a living through political 
employment. They could not afford to lose their occu- 
pation, but were anxious to return to office to play the 
old games of political combination and patronage. As 
they were all out of office, they naturally formed the 
nucleus of an opposition party and were reinforced by 
republicans who were discontented with their relations 
with the central administration. Before the revision of 
the Constitution was completed on February 24, 1891, 
the opposition groups had secured a majority in each 



62 TROPICAL AMERICA 

house. General Deodoro da Fonseca was elected to 
the presidency, but only by a small m? /ority, 129 votes 
being cast for him and 97 for Dr. Prudente de Moraes, 
president of the Congress. Of the five scattering votes, 
two were cast for General Floriano Peixoto, who was 
immediately elected vice-President. Deodoro would 
probably have been defeated, if there had not been 
general apprehension of military intervention and the 
arrest of his principal opponents. 

The provisional ministry had been reorganized in 
the meantime, but the constitutional President de- 
clined either to renew their appointments or to submit 
their nominations to the approval of Congress. This 
uncompromising assertion of his independence of the 
legislators excited criticism. Official interference with 
the freedom of the press was also angrily resented. 
The opposition to the government culminated in the 
passage of three measures directed against the Presi- 
dent. 

The first of these declared that the duties of minister 
of State were incompatible with the exercise of other 
functions. This was a blow aimed directly against 
obnoxious ministers, and especially Lucena, who was 
governor of the State of Pernambuco and a judge of 
the Supreme Court. This bill, after passing both 
houses, was vetoed by the President on the ground 
that it deprived him of his constitutional right of 
choosing his ministers. The senate passed it a second 
time, by a vote of 29 to 15, one vote short of the con- 
stitutional requirement of two-thirds. In order to 
secure the requisite majority, the vote of the Presi- 
dent's brother, who was governor of Alag6as, was 
thrown out, on the ground that he was a double office- 



A NEW ERA IN BRAZIL 63 

holder and disqualified from taking part m the division. 
The President also vetoed a bill for limiting the powers 
of governors in States which had not been organized 
on the basis of home rule. On October 29 he vetoed 
as unconstitutional a third measure, defining the crimes 
for which the Executive was liable to impeachment. 
This bill was passed over the veto by the senate on 
November 2, and subsequently by the chamber of 
deputies. It was at once apparent that either the 
President must submit to impeachment proceedings in 
a senate where two-thirds of the members were hostile 
to him, or else dissolve Congress and establish a mili- 
tary dictatorship. After hesitating for twenty-four 
hours and receiving from the Adjutant-General assur- 
ances of the loyalty of the army to his personal for- 
tunes, he took up arms against Congress. 

On November 4, 1891, a manifesto was published, 
dissolving Congress, and proclaiming martial law in the 
federal district and in the city of Nictheroy on the 
opposite side of the bay from Rio de Janeiro. The 
nation was called upon to choose representatives to a 
new Congress, which should be empowered to revise 
the Constitution under conditions to be made known in 
the decree of convocation. In a manifesto issued to the 
nation, the President reviewed the constitutional con- 
troversies which had arisen and accused the legislators 
of attempting to paralyze the administration and to 
compass the overthrow of the Republic. As the houses 
of Congress were not allowed to assemble, there was no 
counter-demonstration. Most of the States acquiesced 
in the usurpation, but Rio Grande do Sul openly 
revolted against it, organized a revolutionary govern- 
ment, and in twenty days had a force of 50,000 soldiers 



64 TROPICAL AMERICA 

under arms and in readiness to defend tlie State and to 
take the field against the Dictator. A similar move- 
ment in Sao Paulo was suppressed only by rigorous 
action of the governor; and there were similar signs 
of disaffection in Bahia, Pard,, and other States. The 
garrison of Rio de Janeiro, weakened by the with- 
drawal of many battalions for service elsewhere, was 
influenced by popular disapproval of the dictatorship. 
The naval officers, headed by Admirals Wandelkolk 
and Costodio de Mello, after consulting secretly with 
congressional leaders, planned a demonstration against 
Deodoro. The government placed Admiral Wandel- 
kolk and ex-Minister Bocayuva under arrest, but 
Admiral Costodio de Mello escaped to the fleet, pre- 
vailed upon the officers to support him, and brought 
three vessels of war in line of action off the city on 
November 23. President Deodoro, in order to avert 
the bombardment of the capital, resigned his office. 
The vice-President, General Floriano Peixoto, suc- 
ceeded him, reorganized the ministry, and called upon 
Congress to reassemble. This second revolution was 
accomplished without bloodshed and without scenes of 
disorder, except the destruction of two newspaper 
offices. With the overthrow of Deodoro there was a 
return to the constitutional system. 

Dependence upon military force and contempt for 
civilians in public life have been characteristic features 
of the political history of Spanish America. In the 
early days of colonization and conquest military adven- 
turers were constantly complaining of the disturbances 
and intrigues caused by lawyers and Indian-reforming 
monks. Cortes in Mexico, Pizarro in Peru, and the 
governors of Hispaniola, Cartagena, and Panama re- 



A NEW ERA IN BRAZIL 65 

peatedly besought the home governments to recall the 
lawyers and to allow the soldiers to rule the new pos- 
sessions without interference from civilians. The same 
jealousy of lawyers and legislators has been revealed in 
nearly every Spanish- American country since the wars 
for independence. Ordinarily the Presidents have been 
generals; the garrisons have supported them; and when 
lawyers and politicians have harassed them in national 
legislatures, there have been usurpations of power, mili- 
tary dictatorships, and suspensions of constitutional law. 
When Deodoro, after struggling for twelve months with 
the factions in Congress, closed the doors of Sao Chris- 
tovao Palace and proclaimed a dictatorship, he had 
recourse to a familiar expedient of Latin-American 
civilization. The speedy collapse of his administration, 
when it was wholly dependent upon military force, was 
a good augury for the future of Brazil. It disclosed at 
once the weakness of the army by which the Empire 
had been overthrown and the strength and stability of 
the constitutional system. 

In the early days of the Republic, the Provisional 
Ministry were unable to agree upon the radical policy 
of disestablishing the Church. They decreed civil mar- 
riage, but debated for several weeks the expediency of 
cutting off the appropriations for the support of the 
clergy. Ruy Barbosa in conversation with me intimated 
that a compromise was to be brought about, by which 
the salaries of the clergy would be paid while the incum- 
bents of parishes lived, but that no new stipends would 
be provided. Fortunately for Brazil there was no com- 
promise of the disestablishment question. Constant's 
ideas prevailed, and the Church was separated from the 
state. This was a radical measure for disarming and 



66 TROPICAL AMERICA 

suppressing clericalism. Under the Constitution no 
religious denomination was permitted to hold relations 
of dependence upon, or alliance with, the federal or 
State governments. The salaries of the clergy, which 
were formerly paid from the national treasury, were 
suspended, and the States were prohibited from estab- 
lishing, subsidizing, or embarrassing the exercise of 
religious worship. Every church was made free in the 
free State. Civil marriage was recognized as essential. 
Cemeteries were subjected to municipal control. In- 
struction in State schools and public institutions was 
secularized, and municipalities were prohibited from 
modifying this rule. The company of Jesuits was 
excluded from the country, and the founding of new 
convents and monastic orders was forbidden. By these 
and other drastic regulations in the fundamental law, 
the domination of the Church in political affairs was 
completely shattered. Brazil in emancii3ating itself 
from clericalism began very far in advance of the goal 
which had been reached after protracted agitation by 
Chili, the most progressive State in South America. If 
a stagnant country has required thorough processes of 
revolution, so has the lethargic Church. Under the 
Republic there is promise of resurrection among the 
crumbling tombs of national religion. 

Education is what is needed for the leavening of the 
whole lump of Brazilian ignorance and superstition. 
In some of the States efforts have already been put 
forth to render elementary education compulsory, and 
liberal grants have been made for the maintenance of 
schools ; but in the remaining States there are the most 
inadequate provisions for education. According to one 
of the latest official returns there are between 8,000,000 



A NEW ERA IN BRAZIL 67 

and 9,000,000 men, women, and children in Brazil, who 
can neither read nor write. . Until this illiteracy is 
stamped out, there can neither be a permanent religious 
revival in the Roman Catholic Church nor any marked 
progress of Protestantism with its open Bible. The 
budgets voted by the chambers have been appropriated 
mainly for higher education for the medical, law, poly- 
technic, mining, military, and naval schools, which are 
to be visited in Rio de Janeiro. Not one of these insti- 
tutions is worthy of the national capital. There is 
not a university in Brazil, nor is there a single tech- 
nical school of high rank. Private benefactions have 
been swallowed up by innumerable hospitals and asy- 
lums, many of them now out of date and useless, while 
institutions of learning have not been founded. If 
there be such backwardness in promoting the higher 
schools, what must be the state of primary education 
when dependent upon the exhausted exchequers of the 
overtaxed provinces ? 

Perhaps the most hopeful sign for the cause of 
progress and religion is the adoption of educational 
suffrage as the condition of citizenship. This will 
operate in two ways : it will create a general desire 
for education as a means to the attainment of the 
rights of citizenship ; and it will compel the governing 
classes in all the provinces to multiply schools and to 
support them liberally. Negroes or Portuguese, who 
do not themselves read and write, will take pains to 
make voters of their children. The non-voting popu- 
lation will insist upon having schools brought within 
their reach, and provincial assemblies will make more 
generous grants for primary education than have ever 
been sanctioned. Under the Republic, illiteracy, which 



68 TROPICAL AMERICA 

is now a source of national reproach, will inevitably 
decline. There will be more light in a benighted land. 
With light there will come a religious quickening in 
churches which now look like the tombs of a dead 
faith. 

While the rights of national administration and leg- 
islation are reserved for the Executive and Congress, 
each province of the old Empire is armed by the Con- 
stitution with administrative and legislative autonomy 
as a sovereign State. The relations between the fed- 
eral government and the States are determined with 
such precision as to preclude secession, nullification, or 
states rights agitation. At the same time home rule is 
guaranteed by the Constitution. The federal govern- 
ment cannot intervene in the internal affairs of the 
States, except to repel invasion, to maintain the re- 
publican federative form of administration, to restore 
public order upon requisition from the local authorities, 
and to secure the execution of laws of Congress and 
compliance with federal sentences. The National Gov- 
ernment has exclusive power to decree import taxes ; 
entrance, clearance, and port dues ; postal and tele- 
graph contributions ; the maintenance of custom-houses ; 
and the establishment of banks of issue. It exclusively 
pertains to the States to impose taxes upon landed 
property. Within these lines and subject to some 
exemptions respecting ecclesiastical matters, each State 
has a right to adopt a constitution in harmony with 
the federal Constitution, to elect its own executive and 
legislature, and to exercise all the functions of self- 
government. 

The States remained under their provisional govern- 
ments until the Constitution was adopted. Sao Paulo, 



A NEW EEA IN BRAZIL 69 

Pard, Bahia, Pernambuco, and other States, were reor- 
ganized during 1891 with constitutions of their own, pro- 
viding for the election of their own governors and legis- 
latures, and autonomy for municipalities. While the 
most important provinces were converted speedily into 
self-governing States ruled by their own citizens, others 
remained in a transition stage under Deodoro's admin- 
istration. Their condition was hardly distinguishable 
from that of old-time provinces under the Empire, since 
they were governed by partisans of Deodoro. This was 
one of the main grievances debated in Congress. In 
many of the States the popular idea of home rule is the 
right of the leading men in the capital to dismiss a 
governor and to set up a provisional government 
whenever they choose to order a political change. 
There have been several revolutions of this order, and 
the National Government, not having facilities for rapid 
transportation of troops to remote provinces, is powerless 
to prevent them. This distribution of power among the 
States threatens to be detrimental to the stability of the 
National Government. Every State government is at 
the mercy of political mobs and discontented garrisons. 
The Provisional Government was singularly success- 
ful at the outbreak of the revolution in maintaining 
the financial credit of the country. Business steadily 
improved during 1890, and a large coffee crop com- 
manding exceptionally high prices insured favorable 
rates of exchange. When the general elections oc- 
curred and the Constitution was revised and accepted 
by Congress, the feeling of business buoyancy which 
had prevailed, in spite of political uncertainty, created 
a strong speculative movement. During 1891 hundreds 
of banks were organized and mining companies and 



70 TROPICAL AMERICA 

industrial syndicates formed. Appeals were made to 
the government for concessions and contracts on all 
sides, and capital was subscribed for innumerable new 
enterprises. Many of these projects were speculative 
and visionary. Under an unwise decree, for which 
Barbosa was responsible, banks were organized by the 
hundred, and government concessions and contracts 
were granted most recklessly and often under condi- 
tions which involved official corruption. A deprecia- 
tion of the currency and an impairment of public credit 
followed. 

One of the most encouraging signs was a marked 
increase in immigration. In 1889 the number of immi- 
grants arriving in Brazil was 65,161; in 1890 it was 
109,000. This increase not only served to convince 
Brazilians that it was the Empire which had repelled 
Europeans from their shores and caused them to swarm 
into the Plate republics, but also encouraged the 
republican government to sanction land grants and 
immigration schemes on a scale for which even the 
Argentine furnished no precedent. Brazil, during the 
first year of the Republic, became a speculative pande- 
monium. It was menaced during the second year with 
all the evils of financial disorder and collapse of credit 
which had overwhelmed the Argentine. 

The magnitude of these speculative schemes for 
developing the resources of Brazil may be readily illus- 
trated. The area covered by 210 laud grants was 
119,887 square miles, an extent of territory nearly 
equal to that of Great Britain and Ireland. This 
represented national domain, which was given away to 
land speculators and government jobbers. During the 
same period contracts were nominally made for the 



A NEW ERA IN BRAZIL 71 

introduction of 1,415,750 families from Europe. This 
implied a prospective addition of over 7,000,000 to the 
population. The railway grants were equally reckless, 
and hundreds of syndicates of all kinds were furnished 
with monetary guarantees from the treasury. The 
country was flooded with paper money issued by hun- 
dreds of corporations under a free banking law similar 
to that of the Argentine, which had produced most 
disastrous results. Traffic in government concessions 
and speculation in the shares of new railway, mining, 
and industrial enterprises engrossed the attention of 
active politicians and practical business men. It was 
a delirious time, when all classes were overtrading and 
gambling upon the material prosperity which was to 
follow the introduction of republican institutions. 
Every day brought with it a fresh batch of government 
concessions and guarantees for colonies in the wilder- 
ness, new cities in unexplored regions, and ports in 
uninhabited sections of the coast. It was the fatal 
Argentine fever, and it was both malignant and con- 
tagious. 

If Brazil has been saved from the financial revulsions 
which seemed to be impending in 1891, its good for- 
tune is to be attributed to the warning which foreign 
investors had received in the Argentine. When the 
speculators and politicians had locked up their own 
capital in visionary undertakings, they could not find 
a market abroad for shares in their new companies. 
English investors whose hands had been badly burned 
on the Plate looked with suspicion upon the glowing 
prospectuses and refused to believe that the capital 
subscribed represented hard cash. They had already 
invested from $350,000,000 to 1400,000,000 in Bra- 



72 TKOPICAL AMERICA 

zilian securities, and they prudently refrained from 
increasing their holdings. As foreign capital was 
withheld, the native speculative companies soon lan- 
guished from sheer inanition. Disordered conditions 
of exchange, an inflated currency, and higher prices 
than had ever before been known combined to produce 
a reaction. Financial reform became the crowning 
issue of the day. 

There are two phrases which are constantly heard in 
Brazil. One is, "Wait a little," and the other is, "Be 
patient." Each reveals a national habit of deliberation 
and procrastination formed under the influence of an 
enervating climate. From race instinct Brazilians have 
adapted themselves slowly and mechanically to the 
altered political and social conditions under the Repub- 
lic. As they are never known either to make haste in 
business or pleasure or to be anxious for the morrow, 
they have not expected republican institutions to ac- 
complish at once the work of national regeneration. 
They have been content to wait a little and to be 
patient. This is a quality of mind which has recon- 
ciled them to a gradual and laborious fulfilment of 
expectations of material progress inspired by the over- 
throw of the Empire. They believe that they have 
entered upon a future of brilliant promise. They know 
that Brazil is a country whose resources are practically 
inexhaustible ; that there is hardly a plantation or forest 
product of tropical climes which cannot be raised under 
the most favorable conditions on their soil ; that their 
mountains are rich in iron, lead, gold, and precious 
stones ; that their river system is unparalleled, and that 
they have all the requirements for making a wealthy and 
powerful nation. The Provisional Government was 



A NEW ERA IN BRAZIL 73 

irregular in its processes and arbitrary in its decrees, 
but it opened a way for the industrial development of 
the most wonderful country on the face of the earth. 
Faith in the future of Brazil has reconciled the people 
to disordered finances, temporary military usurpation, 
and constitutional anomalies. They have consoled 
themselves with the reflection that democratic and 
industrial progress has been retarded there, as else- 
where in Latin America, by prevailing conditions of 
popular ignorance, but that republican institutions in 
the end will inevitably accomplish their perfect work. 



ENTRANCE OF THE PLATE 

HOW A COMMERCIAL EMPIRE HAS BEEN 'WON HUMBLE 

PIE FOR AN AMERICAN EUROPEAN MARITIME ENTER- 
PRISE — MONTEVIDEO AND ITS SUBURBS — NIGHT PASSAGE 
TO BUENOS AYRES 

An American who visits the Brazilian coast towns 
and continues the voyage to the river Plate can hardly 
fail to be impressed with the commercial enterprise of 
maritime Europe. An empire lost in the northern 
hemisphere has been replaced by another gained during 
the present century. A hundred years ago the Euro- 
pean was driven from the American colonies and com- 
pelled to resign control over a continental domain which 
is now the industrial empire of a free people number- 
ing 63,000,000. What was lost in the North has been 
regained in the South. Latin America is the commer- 
cial empire of the maritime nations of Europe. They 
hold two-thirds of the national debt of Brazil. They 
have supplied a large share of the capital required for 
railway, banking, and industrial enterprises there. 
They have organized the internal trade of the Amazon 
valley. They have established their ascendency in 
the coast towns and made the import trade their own. 
They control the commerce of the Plate countries at 
Montevideo and Buenos Ayres. The weight of their 
74 



ENTRANCE OF THE PLATE 75 

capital, maritime enterprise, and industrial skill is felt 
all the way from the Straits of Magellan to the Isthmus. 
South America is tenanted by proud nations, jealous of 
their political liberties ; but it is the commercial depen- 
dency of maritime Europe. 

I went down the coast from Rio de Janeiro in the 
steamer Britannia with a merry company of English 
travellers who were bound for Patagonia, the Falkland 
Islands, and Chili. Most of them were sheep-farmers, 
and they told me that the capital required for opening 
Patagonia on both the Argentine and Chilian coasts was 
supplied from England. The bleak Falkland Islands 
are tenanted by Scotchmen, who have opened large 
sheep-farms there. This is the southernmost European 
colony in the New World, and while it has a popula- 
tion of only five thousand the English are there to 
make what they can out of it. As we were smoking 
and chatting together from day to day, the ship passed 
the entrance to the lower coffee belt at Santos and 
coasted along three of the southern provinces of Brazil : 
Parand, a State as large as Kansas ; then Santa Catha- 
rina, as small as Maine; and at last Rio Grande do 
Sul, equal to New York and Pennsylvania combined. 
The lofty sierras of the coffee belt were reduced to 
gently sloping hills, and a rolling prairie offered rich 
pasturage for cattle and sheep. The list of agricul- 
tural products, which began under the equator with 
rubber and included sugar, cotton, tobacco, and coffee 
in the direction of the tropic, was completed with 
wool, hides, and wheat on the borders of the temperate 
zone. Beyond Rio Grande do Sul and Porto Alegre 
was the gateway of the Plate, the majestic river en- 
trance to the three republics of the South, whose Indus- 



76 TROPICAL AMERICA 

tries were also almost wholly agricultural. Europe 
directs and controls their trade and supplies them with 
manufactures of its own as completely as it monopolizes 
the commerce of the Brazilian seaboard from the shift- 
ing delta of the Amazon to the shingles and sand 
dunes of Rio Grande do Sul. 

How has this commercial empire, which replaces what 
the English lost a century ago in North America, what 
the French sold for a song in Louisiana, and what the 
Spanish frittered away by misgovernment in the far 
South, been regained by modern Europe ? The secret of 
the establishment of European commercial supremacy 
in that part of the world is the intelligence with which 
the shipping and mercantile interests of maritime na- 
tions have been fostered and developed. The American 
Civil War marked the turning-point in the substitu- 
tion of steam for sail poAver in the transportation of 
ocean freight. About 1865 the first English mail 
steamer was running into Montevideo with a govern- 
ment subsidy. At the end of twenty years there were 
618 European steamers, with a tonnage of 900,000, enter- 
ing the same port, a tonnage nearly three times as great 
as that of the sailing fleet. At the end of 1888 the ton- 
nage had risen to 1,264,919, with more than two 
steamers a day. This marked the triumph of superior 
maritime enterprise. While the United States has 
been neglecting its shipping interests and doing noth- 
ing to restore its commercial marine on the high seas, 
Europe has been building and manning merchant fleets 
by which an empire could be conquered. 

If any American, weak and lowly in spirit, have a 
voracious appetite for humble pie, let him take passage 
for the Plate. He will find Montevideo and Buenos 



ENTRANCE OF THE PLATE 77 

Ayres the most enterprising cities of the southern hemi- 
sphere, and in each harbor he will see a magnificent 
merchant fleet, representing every maritime nation ex- 
cept his own. He will recognize off the water-front of 
Montevideo the flags of England, France, Germany, 
Italy, Spain, Belgium, and Brazil, flying from steam- 
ships lying at anchor, and he will see a swarm of Nor- 
wegian, Danish, English, Italian, and German sailing 
vessels; but he will look in vain for the American 
flag, unless he catches a glimpse, as I did, of the colors 
of some poor old war ship like the Tallapoosa. That 
battered hulk was in the harbor when I arrived and 
another relic of old-time naval architecture, the Rich- 
mond., was on the way from Bahia to the South Atlantic 
station. These ships were needed, perhaps, to complete 
the exhibition of American degeneracy in the maritime 
world. 

I was fully prepared, after landing and passing the 
customs line, for the look of bewilderment on the face 
of the genial proprietor of the French hotel, when he 
was asked to direct me to the American consulate. He 
did not know where it was, although it was found 
subsequently only a few blocks from the hotel. He 
was too polite to be offensive and apparently was un- 
willing to confess that he was unaware of the presence 
of any American functionary in the city. There were 
similar signs of incredulity and bewilderment in other 
faces when I sought in the streets for pilotage to the 
consulate. Shop-keepers doing business within a block 
of the office had never heard of an American consul. 
Apparently people in Montevideo vaguely regard the 
United States as being a curious country, having a 
place somewhere on the map of the western hemi- 



78 TROPICAL AMERICA 

sphere. They think of it very much as children in 
American schools idly conjecture what the ice-fields 
surrounding the North Pole are like. Europe sends 
out its merchant fleets to their harbor to stock their 
shops and houses with everything which human inge- 
nuity can devise for promoting comfortable or luxurious 
living. The United States no longer contributes freel}'-, 
as in the olden time, its Yankee notions. American 
ships enter the harbor so infrequently that the children 
of Montevideo are growing up in ignorance of the 
mighty industrial nation that styles itself " The Grand 
Republic." 

At the close of the American Civil War two ocean 
steamers entered Montevideo in the course of a 
month. Now there are two arrivals every day the 
year round, exclusive of river craft and coasters. At 
Buenos Ayres there has been an even greater develop- 
ment of commerce. The tide of immigration rises 
higher every year, and the Argentine is filling up with 
European settlers. It is the marvellous progress of the 
United States reduced to south latitude. France and 
Italy, under a system of navigation and ship-building 
bounties, have largely increased their steam fleets in 
those waters. Germany and England, with liberal 
compensation for mail transportation, haA^e easily kept 
abreast with the progress of their rivals. There is 
intense rivalry among the four chief maritime powers 
for the control of the commerce of the Plate. So fast is 
the pace that sailing vessels are dropping out of the race. 
The French bounty law of 1881 and the Italian bounty 
law of 1885 have failed to revive the sailing marines of 
those countries. It is a steamship race, and the United 
States has not a single entry out of 765. It had sixteen 



ENTEANCE OF THE PLATE 79 

sailing vessels in port during 1888, out of 1357 arrivals 
of all classes, and not one steamship. European rivals 
are making extraordinary exertions to enlarge their 
fleets and to establish commercial supremacy. The 
United States has done nothing, at least until March, 
1891, to aid its commerce. It regards Montevideo as a 
healthful station for its South Atlantic squadron and 
apparently is content with its humiliating effacement 
from the struggle for maritime ascendency. 

The four great powers, which have largely increased 
their commercial marines in the course of ten years, 
have also doubled their export trade. Belgium, which 
recently subsidized an English line, has increased her 
volume of exports to Uruguay nearly five times. France 
and Italy under bounty laws have done well. The United 
States alone remains stationary, for it is the only great 
country in the world that systematically neglects the 
interests of its commercial marine. Against a fleet of 
294 European steamships, it had in 1890 five steamers 
on the Brazil coast as far as Santos, and nothing below 
except a sailing vessel perhaps once or twice a month 
in the harbor of Montevideo. The exports to the 
United States show no perceptible increase from year 
to year. In 1889 the aggregate was $2,252,428, against 
$2,347,054 in 1882. The exports from the United 
States to Montevideo are equally inelastic. Trade 
with maritime Europe flourishes and multiplies with 
the development of its commercial marine. Trade with 
the United States languishes and shrinks from sheer 
inanition. Americans in Montevideo are naturally 
humiliated by the meagre exhibit made by their coun- 
try's merchant marine. I met many of them, for Mr. 
Hill, the consul, introduced me at the English Club to 



80 TROPICAL AMERICA 

a swarm of bright acquaintances and ended by taking 
me to dinner at the Uruguay Club with the American 
minister, General Maney. In a single day I was made 
to feel entirely at home in what is undoubtedly the 
pleasantest and most social city in South America, 
and during a fortnight's visit in Uruguay I was highly 
favored with genuine evidences of hospitality. I can 
speak with confidence respecting the sentiment of 
Americans there respecting the decadence of the com- 
mercial marine. 

From the mouth of the Plate a single high hill close 
to the water's edge is. seen. It is the landmark from 
which Montevideo derives its name. It guards the 
entrance to a deep cove, which forms the inner harbor. 
Opposite stands the city on a peninsula, perhaps half 
a mile in width, the street levels sloping toward the 
river-front on one side, and toward the back bay on 
the other. Thirty years ago only a portion of this pen- 
insula was occupied. Now the city stretches outward 
for miles along the river, and back of the bay there are 
beautiful suburbs with lovely gardens. The suburbs 
encircle the bay and fringe the base of the mountain, 
with its fortifications and slaughter pens. The popu- 
lation probably exceeds 200,000 and is -increasing with 
remarkable rapidity. Immigration within the last 
decade has reinforced the Uruguayan stock with large 
contingents from Italy and Spain. Italians take the 
place of the negroes of a Brazilian coast city as the 
working population. They man the lighters, pave 
the streets, and do a large part of the manual labor. 
Spanish is the prevailing language, but Italian can be 
heard at every turn. There are also thousands of 
Basques from Spain and France, and as many Brazil- 



ENTEANCE OP THE PLATE 81 

ians from the southern provinces. Uruguay is a coun- 
try about as large as the six New England States, 
with New Jersey and Delaware added. It has a popu- 
lation of 800,000, with 600,000 native Uruguayans. 

Buenos Ayres has a new system of water-front and 
docks under construction, but Montevideo, with a har- 
bor that could easily be improved, has allowed its ener- 
getic rival across the Plate to surpass it in enterprise. 
The depth of water, in the bay opposite the Cerro, is 
five feet less than it was seventy years ago, and is now 
receding a few inches every year. The ocean steamers 
cannot enter the inner harbor, but anchor outside in a 
roadstead that is often dangerous. Engineers have 
devised a system of jetties by which twenty-five feet 
of water will be provided in the bay ; but although a 
company has been organized to construct the new port, 
and legislative appropriations have been made for the 
work, these greatly needed harbor improvements are 
deferred year after year. Montevideo lacks enterprise, 
but it has scenic beauty and natural advantages to which 
its ambitious and successful competitor can never aspire. 
The Cerro, with its crumbling Spanish fort and revolv- 
ing lighthouse, furnishes a setting for the handsome, 
well-built town. As the steamer arrives at the anchor- 
age at sunset, the architectural lines of the more con- 
spicuous buildings are softened and refined by the 
fading light. The fa9ade of the Solis Theatre, perhaps 
the handsomest modern building in South America, 
catches the eye. The Matrix Church in Plaza Con- 
stitucion looms up, and the long line of the Julio, the 
finest avenue to be seen in the southern hemisphere, is 
distinctly traced. The bolsa stands out among the 
handsome banks of the Cerrito quarter. The English 



82 TIlOriCAL A.M ERICA 

Church, with its Grecian front, is in line with the 
Campo Santo, the unique necropolis by the water's 
edge. Beyond the city's compactly and even massively 
built streets are the quintas of Paso del Molino, embow- 
ered in their parks and gardens. By no trick of atmos- 
pheric effect nor shifting of sunset light can plain, 
prosaic Buenos Ayres be transfigured to equal comeli- 
ness and beauty. 

Montevideo is neither quaint like Bahia nor pictur- 
esque like Rio, but it is modern and handsome. The 
streets are wide, well paved and lighted, and compactly 
built up. The architecture is modern and massive. 
Granite and Italian marbles are used in the handsome 
building fronts. Portuguese tiles are seen only in the 
oldest quarters of the town. Plaster fronts, so common 
in Brazil, are replaced with fine building stone, much 
of which is quarried in the Uruguay hills. The leading 
thoroughfare, the Julio, recording a date of patriotic 
memory, is approached from Plaza Constitucion, where 
stands the cathedral, a massive building with two 
towers. On another side is the showy Uruguay Club 
house. Close at hand is the chief opera house and 
theatre of the town. A few blocks further on is a 
plaza, surrounded on four sides by government and 
other buildings, with continuous lines of colonnades 
and arcades, a unique and striking effect. A third 
plaza with a graceful column surmounted with a statue 
of Liberty is in the heart of the city. All the way from 
Plaza Independencia, the Julio is lined with handsome 
shops, in which European goods are attractively dis- 
played. It has the airy effect of a cool, tasteful Pari- 
sian boulevard. 

Montevideo is as modern in its manner of life as in 



ENTRANCE OF THE PLATE 83 

its architectural aspects. Bustle and activity pervade 
its streets. There are street cars trundling in every 
thoroughfare, the musical horns of the conductor being 
heard long past midnight and in the earliest hours of the 
morning. Handsome carriages and cabs are in the 
streets. The wide sidewalks are thronged with a busy, 
energetic, and thrifty population. There is a wide- 
awake and prosperous air about the town, that reminds 
one strongly of Boston, to which it bears a marked 
resemblance in topographical features and compactness 
of construction. But Montevideo is European rather 
than American in its aspects and customs. It is a 
modern Spanish town, with glimpses of Italian archi- 
tecture and French refinement of taste, and with the 
commercial bustle and movement of Bremen or Ham- 
burg. The custom-house is an institution conducted 
on modern principles and with a business intelligence 
that is lacking in Brazil. There is no dawdling in 
street or in shop. Men have work to do, and they do 
not waste time over it. The city belongs to the last 
decade of the nineteenth century, and not midway in 
the eighteenth, like many of the Brazilian towns. 

The most beautiful suburb of the city is Paso del 
Molino, where is the Prado, a public park, with line 
upon line of tasteful villas surrounded with gardens. 
These suburban houses are utterly unlike the old- 
fashioned Portuguese mansions of Brazil and belong to 
the modern class of spacious, well-designed, and thor- 
oughly comfortable country residences. The gardens 
are lovely. The latitude is lower by seven degrees 
than that of New York and the climate is more equable. 
Greenhouses are largely dispensed with, the tempera- 
ture, even in the coldest weather, being above the 



84 TROPICAL AMERICA 

freezing-point. Roses require no protection in winter, 
and flowers are blooming all the year in these spacious 
and orderly gardens. Fine lawns are infrequent, the 
grass not being suitable for good landscape effects ; but 
the displays of trees and flowering shrubbery of all 
kinds are exceedingly beautiful. 

Uruguay is a stock-raising and sheep-farming coun- 
try, whose commercial interests are intimately con- 
nected with those of the Argentine Republic and 
Paraguay on one side and with those of Brazil on the 
other. It was originally a dependency of Brazil, but 
broke away from the Empire in 1825 and adopted a 
constitution in 1830. After a transition period of 
political confederation with Paraguay and the Argen- 
tine as one of the United Provinces of the Rio de la 
Plata, it is now a self-governing State in close commer- 
cial intercourse with those republics as well as with 
Brazil. General Maney undertook to instruct me at 
his hospitable mansion respecting the mysteries of 
Uruguayan politics, but even the most genial diplo- 
matist is an unsafe guide when he is at his post in a 
foreign country, for he will be certain to take optimis- 
tic views in regard to the government to which he is 
accredited. The impression which I received from 
other sources was that the government had been in 
recent years one of the most despotic in Spanish 
America. One can hear in Montevideo blood-curdling 
tales of military cabals and political assassinations. 
For forty years there has been civil strife and one 
Executive after another has been overthrown before 
his term was half over. The Presidents, with the army 
and police behind them, have exercised almost absolute 
power. There have been two legislative houses, a 
senate, elected by indirect suffrage, and a chamber of 



ENTRANCE OF THE PLATE 85 

I'epresentatives, chosen in the proportion of one to 
every 3000 who can read and write; and when Con- 
gress is not in session there has been a legislative 
committee nominally in control of the government; 
but practically the President is master of the situa- 
tion. While he is not eligible to re-election, he 
ordinarily names his successor and elects him. While 
I was in Montevideo, President Tages proclaimed his 
intention of abstaining from influencing the choice of 
his successor. A civilian candidate at once appeared 
upon the scene, and Uruguayans were greatly interested 
in watching the result. If he could be elected, it would 
be the transition from a military dictatorship to genuine 
republican government. Apparently President Tages 
could not resist the temptation to exert his influence, 
for not long after my departure I learned that the civil- 
ian candidate was unsuccessful and that a favorite of 
the President was chosen as his successor. 

The passage from Montevideo to Buenos Ayres cor- 
responds to the journey between Boston and New York 
without the railway ride. It occupies one night and 
is esteemed the most luxurious travelling of which 
Spanish-American civilization is capable. The Venus 
and the ^olo are regarded on the Plate very much as 
the Puritan and the Pilgrim are in New York and 
Boston, as unrivalled passenger steamers. They have 
handsomely furnished saloon parlors and dining-rooms, 
electric lights in the cabins, and excellent service. In 
its lavish hospitality. La Platense Flotilla, Limited, 
left the narrowest possible margin for grievances. It 
provided a bunch of flowers at each plate, a dinner of a 
dozen courses, and wines, cordials, and brandy. At 
nine o'clock tea was served with whiskey as a sweet- 
ener for those who wanted it, and in the morning every 



86 TROPICAL AMERICA 

passenger had his pot of coffee before leaving the boat. 
There was no extra charge for this luxurious living, 
the passage ticket covering the expense of the journey. 
The ladies of Montevideo are famous in South Amer- 
ica for their beauty and the refinement of their manners. 
There were many of them on the Venus, disjjlaying 
expensive Parisian gowns, as well as vivacity in conver- 
sation. As a foil for them there were a dozen nuns 
with their sombre garb. I sat near them at dinner and 
noticed that the discipline of their order was not austere, 
since they drank wine with freedom and chatted with 
men at the table. Conversation was almost wholly in 
Spanish, with an undertone of French. From Brazil 
to the Plate one passes suddenly from Portuguese to 
Spanish America. The languages are so closely allied 
as to be double cousins. In Brazil I had found that a 
Portuguese and a Spaniard could talk at ease, each 
understanding the other while speaking his own tongue. 
In the Plate countries there is little Portuguese, but 
Italian is the language of the working people who have 
recently emigrated from southern Europe. There are 
large Italian quarters in Montevideo and Buenos Ajres. 
but Spanish will always predominate as the language 
of South America. It is not necessary that a traveller 
should speak either Portuguese or Spanish in order to 
visit Brazil and the Plate countries. French hotels 
and restaurants are found all along the coast. There 
are French book-stores in every town. Familiarity with 
the French language is more useful to a traveller in 
that part of the world than a smattering of Spanish and 
Portuguese. With English he can get on, albeit 
laboriously, but with French he can travel in comfort 
from Par4 to Buenos Ayres and from Valparaiso to 
Caracas, 



VI 

ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 

new harbor of buenos ayres — chicago latitude 
south — la plata and its port — rapid progress 

of rosario agricultural colonies mediaeval 

cordova over the pampas to mendoza the 

Argentine's best investment — an orgy of cur- 
rency INFLATION AND SPECULATION POLITICAL CA- 
BALS AND JOBBERY THE REVOLUTION OF JULY, 1890 

FUTURE OF THE ARGENTINE 

The first glimpse of Buenos Ayres after the night 
passage from Montevideo reveals the energy of the 
Argentine nation, the South American Yankee-land. 
The new harbor even in its unfinished state is a mag- 
nificent work of engineering. The city has a frontage 
of four miles on the river Plate, into which empties a 
little stream, the Riachuelo. Harbor there was none, 
until the work of artificially making one was under- 
taken. So great was the wash of sand inshore that the 
heaviest ocean steamers were forced to anchor from 
twelve to twenty miles from the city, landing passen- 
gers by steam tenders, boats, and water-carts, and dis- 
charging cargoes by lighters. The Boca, or mouth of 
the Riachuelo, was taken as the base of operations for 
providing the city with a port. The bed of this little 
stream was excavated, a series of levees was built along 
its banks, and a channel ten miles long was dredged 
and marked with buoys to the deep water of the Plate. 

87 



88 TROPICAL AMERICA 

This work occupied twelve years, and furnished a pro- 
visional harbor which could be entered by vessels draw- 
ing twenty-four feet of water. It has been supplemented 
by the Madero port work, which was begun in 1885 un- 
der government contract with an English company. At 
the entrance to the Boca a breakwater was built along 
the water-front of the city, but at a long distance from 
it. BetAveen this wall and the old water-front a series 
of five immense basins was planned, connecting by 
wide canals with one another end to end, with the Boca 
at the harbor entrance, and with a northern basin, where 
there will be an opening in the malecon and a second 
passage seaward. 

This stupendous work, as I saw it under the pilotage 
of Mr. Baker, the American consul, was only partly 
finished, but the benefits to shipping interests were 
already very great. The Riachuelo was jammed with 
vessels, and the levees were piled high with merchan- 
dise. The entrance channel was open and the south 
dock was filled with European steamers. The second 
and third docks were in an advanced stage of construc- 
tion, and the breakwater had been built for a distance of 
a mile and a half. Scores of streets had been opened, 
sewered, and paved, and business structures were rap- 
idly filling the empty spaces of reclaimed land. With 
deep water outside the malecon, it will be possible to 
sewer and drain the city without having the Plate a 
constant source of contamination. Like every other 
public work in the Argentine, the new port has been 
tainted with jobbery and scandal. It will be cheap at 
any price if it fulfils the expectations of the engineers. 

Buenos Ayres, as I saw it on the eve of the col- 
lapse of its fortunes, was Chicago reduced to southern 



ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 89 

latitude. When I went to the Boca and looked at the 
shipping jammed in the Riachuelo, I was reminded of 
Chicago River. When I returned by train along the 
water's edge and went out to Belgrano, passing two 
riverside parks, I recalled again the metropolis of the 
West with its railways, pleasure-grounds, and palatial 
residences along the lake shore. The sun rose over a 
river so broad that it was like Lake Michigan. From 
that river base, the city had shot out north, south, and 
west over a level plain, doubling its population within 
a decade and developing an immense volume of busi- 
ness. It was the most important railway centre of 
South America. It was the outlet for continental 
reaches of wheat belt. It was the chief slaughter-house 
for the stock-raising pampas. It commanded a river 
system exceeding in volume the Mississippi. Its com- 
merce had expanded into enormous compass. It was 
fairly pulsating with vitality, enterprise, and ambition. 
It had absolute faith in its destiny as one of the chief 
commercial centres of the world. It had intense local 
pride and was not particularly modest. In all these 
respects it strongly resembled the Chicago of the North. 
Buenos Ayres was like Chicago six months after the 
great fire ; but there had been no calamity involving the 
necessity of the reconstruction of the city on a large 
scale. It was only the end of a mad revel of profligacy 
and jobbery, during which the national capital was 
squandering the millions lent by credulous English 
investors on the strength of the Barings' recommen- 
dation. My first stroll carried me to the civic centre, 
Plaza Victoria, and revealed the most characteristic of 
the extravagant public works undertaken by Presi- 
dent Juarez Celman. This was the new Mayo boule- 



90 TROPICAL AMERICA 

vard. Opening into the plaza were two narrow 
thoroughfares several miles in length. Between these 
two streets a broad avenue was laid out at an expense 
of many millions. Some of the most massive buildings 
of the town were either pulled down or reduced to 
narrow and unshapely shells, in order to furnish space 
for this boulevard. It was a stupendous job, out of 
which contractors and corrupt officials made fortunes. 
I could not judge fairly of the artistic effect in the 
unfinished state of the boulevard, but it was evident 
that a large section of the business quarter had been 
reconstructed at higli cost without any apparent neces- 
sity for the improvement. 

Plaza Victoria is surrounded by the government 
palace, the law courts, the capitol, the cabildo, the 
cathedral, the bishop's palace, the bolsa, and the 
national bank. Even with its two patriotic monu- 
ments, the square is a bare and unattractive place and 
illustrates Sir Arthur Helps 's remark, "The Spanish 
like not many trees." Millions have been expended 
there in pavements and luxuriously appointed build- 
ings. Although some of the new government struct- 
ures have fine lines, there is a jumble of architectural 
effects. The cathedral remains the most impressive 
structure of the great plaza. There are many costly 
buildings in Buenos Ayres, notably the banks, com- 
mercial exchanges, government offices, and railway 
stations. Millions have been invested in ornamental 
fronts of brick and stucco designed by French and 
Italian architects. While the small squares in the 
heart of the city are unattractive, there is a park of 840 
acres at Palermo with two fine driveways, bordered 
with palms and firs and illuminated at night with a 



PI 



wn^ 





V 





ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 91 

glare of electric light. Palatial residences abound in 
that quarter, Avhere fortunes made by speculation or by 
maladministration of public money were squandered 
in showy architecture and luxurious furnishing. Be- 
wildering as was the display of equipages in the Argen- 
tine Rotten Row, and sumptuous as was the manner of 
life of the wealthy classes, there was something unreal 
and artificial in the ostentatious splendors of the capi- 
tal. One scarcely needed to be told that the nation had 
been borrowing money abroad beyond its resources, had 
gone on contracting new loans in order to meet the in- 
terest on its old debts, and had wasted its substance on 
luxurious houses and profligate living. 

Hardly had I established myself in the Grand Hotel 
and through the courtesy of General Pitkin, the Amer- 
ican minister, and Mr. Baker, the American consul, 
received introductions to a large circle of influential and 
agreeable acquaintances, before the professional statisti- 
cians made a concerted attack upon me. These iogen- 
uous gentlemen had been remarkably successful in flat- 
tering the vanity of the town by every method of com- 
parison with the great cities of the world, and the 
incoming traveller was importuned to accept the evi- 
dence of their calculations and averages. I felt help- 
less in the toils of these figure-working magicians 
until they sought to demonstrate by statistics that 
Buenos Ayres was one of the handsomest cities in 
Christendom. Then I knew my ground and rebelled. 
The Argentine capital has been greatly improved dur- 
ing the last decade, especially along the river-front, 
where the Paseo de Julio has been converted into 
a spacious boulevard; but it is neither as favorably 
situated nor as attractive in architecture, suburbs, and 



92 TROPICAL AMERICA 

pleasure-grounds as Montevideo. The picturesque 
beauties of Bahia and the majestic mountain scenery 
of Rio de Janeiro are lacking. The streets are uniform 
in narrowness, and the shops and houses on one are like 
the shops and houses on the others. The miniature 
plazas fail to break the monotonous effect of the pro- 
fusely ornamented stucco fronts. There is a ceaseless 
rumble of traffic by day and a blaze of electric light by 
night. As a centre of business activity Buenos Ayres 
has been unique in South America, but bustle is not 
beauty and trade statistics have no power of refreshing 
the eye. 

Exception must be taken in favor of the churches, 
which are the handsomest to be found on the Atlantic 
coast of South America. The cathedral was begun 
in 1580 and rebuilt in 1752, and the imposing fagade 
was subsequently added by General Rosas, a tyrant 
who needed to do something for religion to atone for 
his crimes against liberty. The portico is upheld by 
twelve Corinthian columns, and the tympanum has 
a bass-relief of patriotic significance. It represents 
Joseph embracing his brethren and commemorates the 
reunion of Buenos Ayres with the other Argentine 
provinces. In the vast interior, which is nearly as 
spacious as Notre Dame in Paris, there is a high 
altar under a dome rising 130 feet and there are 
twelve side chapels. Many of the churches are built 
of stone or polished marble and are modern structures, 
with fine architectural lines. There are eight or 
ten Protestant churches, the English church being 
perhaps the most conspicuous. There is absolute 
religious tolerance in the Argentine. The Church 
is not disestablished, appropriations amounting to 



ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 93 

$215,000 for the stipends of the clergy being included 
in the annual budgets ; but this is a meagre sum. The 
influence of the Church is very different in the 
Argentine from what it is in Brazil, The clergy are 
educated men, the parishes are centres of religious life, 
and an active work of practical benevolence is carried 
on. The population is one of higher intelligence than 
can be found anywhere in Brazil. Great attention has 
been paid to education, free schools having been estab- 
lished in all the leading towns. There are 170 schools 
in the national capital, with lyceums for higher instruc- 
tion, a university, and a medical school. 

When my statistical mentors refrained from poaching 
upon the domain of aesthetics, I was content to follow 
them, and to bear my tribute to evidences of material 
progress and commercial enterprise unparalleled in the 
annals of Tropical America. The population of the 
city was 78,500 in 1857; and it is at least 550,000 
to-day. Its foreign trade rose from -121,000,000 in 
1850 to 1228,000,000 in 1889. This phenomenal prog- 
ress had the effect of stimulating the imagination of 
the town. It had the largest possible ideas of its own 
importance and destiny. What the statisticians did not 
affect to deny was that Buenos Ayres, with all its splen- 
did enterprise, had been largely dependent upon foreign 
intelligence and capital for its extraordinary progress. 
There are many phases of resemblance between Buenos 
Ayres and Chicago, but here is a sharp line of contrast. 
Chicago is not in bondage to foreign merchants, manu- 
facturers, and capitalists, but shapes and directs its own 
commercial destiny. 

The chief cause of the financial disorders by which 
the industrial energies of the Argentine have been par- 



94 TEOPICAL AMERICA 

alyzed since 1889 was an orgy of currency inflation 
and speculative activity, induced by rapid national 
growth and excessive supplies of foreign capital, bor- 
rowed at high rates of interest. For a decade all 
classes of landowners and business men Avere in a fever 
of excitement, undertaking the most reckless and chi- 
merical schemes, under the delusion that anything and 
everything could be done in a country advancing at 
high speed in material prosperity and receiving an 
enormous increase of population from southern Europe. 
One gets an inkling of the truth when he hears at the 
clubs recitals of the vagaries of speculation during 
recent years and is informed of the stupendous opera- 
tions of the mortgage banks ; but when he spends a 
morning at the bolsa and then takes a journey to La 
Plata he receives convincing object lessons. 

The stock exchange is a vast structure with a spa- 
cious hall surrounded by a gallery, where scenes of 
excitement and reckless speculation have been enacted, 
rivalling those of Wall Street in the most feverish 
times. The number of members ranges between 4000 
and 5000; and while gold transactions are the most 
important, every class of securities is dealt with by a 
mob of carefully dressed Argentine dandies on the 
floor. These gamblers in gold and stocks, whose oper- 
ations represented a nominal valuation of hundreds 
of millions a jesir, had been transformed from the sim- 
plicity of pampa farmers to Parisian speculators. Pre- 
cocious children of the South, with imitative powers 
which enabled them to adapt themselves rapidly to 
European manners and ideas, they had been drawn into 
the city by an unlimited supply of foreign money and 
unrivalled opportunities for public jobbery. The cupid- 



ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 95 

ity of European investors reaching after high rates of 
interest stimulated tlieir own avarice. Every one of 
these brokers had aspired to become a millionaire in the 
course of a few years, to build a palace in the fashiona- 
ble quarter, to drive afternoon and evening at Palermo 
in the procession of brilliant equipages, and to live as 
luxuriously as the Barings and all the European money- 
lenders, who were ministering to his vices and com- 
passing his ultimate ruin. 

In the halcyon days of English investments and 
Italian immigration, nothing seemed impracticable in 
the Argentine. La Plata was a city built to order in 
an incredibly short period and was at once a success 
and a failure. It was laid out on paper in 1881 by the 
governor of Buenos Ayres, and designed to be like 
Washington, a city of magnificent distances. Buenos 
Ayres, from historic times the capital of the province, 
had been made, after a protracted political and sectional 
struggle, the capital of the Argentine Confederation. 
Dr. Rocha determined to build a new capital, which 
would be at once spacious, handsome, and modern. 
He was successful in this part of his scheme. He failed 
when he attempted at La Plata to rival Buenos Ayres 
in commerce, business activity, and civic influence. 

Everything was planned on a broad scale. Sites were 
set apart for the provincial assembly, the governor's 
residence, the provincial departments, a city hall, a 
spacious railway station, libraries, museums, schools, 
churches, and everything befitting the dignity of the 
largest, richest, and most influential State of the Con- 
federation. The streets were laid out as broad avenues, 
twice or three times as wide as the thoroughfares of 
Buenos Ayres. Buildings of splendid proportions 



96 TROPICAL AMERICA 

were planned, at long distances one from another, and 
surrounded with ample grounds, artistically planted 
for landscape effects. Spaces were reserved for squares 
and public gardens, which were lacking in Buenos 
Ayres. Thousands of workmen were employed to 
build the city in two years. Ensenada, the port, lay 
three miles away, with outer and inner roadsteads and 
a bar between them. In order to convert it into a 
harbor it was necessary to deepen the channel between 
the basins and to construct a canal several miles long. 
After millions had been expended, La Plata was sup- 
plied with an artificial port and opened to the commerce 
of the world. The provincial departments were re- 
moved from Buenos Ayres in 1884. All the conven- 
iences and appliances of civilization were supplied. 
Even a new cemetery was opened, so that incoming 
residents could have a feeling that they might die and 
be comfortably buried whenever they liked. 

La Plata lies to the south of Buenos Ayres, an hour's 
journey by railway from the central station in the Paseo 
de Julio. The train draws up into a spacious and well- 
appointed depot. A broad avenue lined with palaces 
s-tretches in either direction as far as the eye can see. 
These stately structures with their marble colonnades 
and imposing facades are the finest to be found in the 
southern hemisphere. The legislative halls, the law 
courts, the department buildings, the governor's pal- 
ace, the provincial banks, the observatory, the museum, 
are happily varied in form and design. Each stands 
alone and is surrounded by spacious grounds. There 
is a monumental entrance to a neglected park, which 
was intended to rival Palermo. The cathedral alone is 
unfinished. The port works represent a financial outlay 



ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 97 

of at least $17,000,000 in gold, and the government's 
expenditures in the city cannot have been less than 
160,000,000. 

When the city was building, there were extensive 
land speculations, and hundreds of houses were erected 
at high cost, every real estate operator hastily assuming 
that the expenditure of millions of government money 
would involve of necessity permanent commercial pros- 
perity. The completion of the principal provincial 
buildings and the removal of the government officials to 
their new residences were followed by a rush of popula- 
tion. In the course of the first two years a census was 
taken and 30,000 residents were reported, and the 
population subsequently increased to 50,000. Speedily 
officials grew weary of the monotonous life of the town 
and attempted to resume their residence in Buenos 
Ayres, going out to La Plata in the morning and 
returning in the evening. Prompt measures were taken 
to prevent these desertions, and members of the civil 
service were required to live in the city. The land 
speculators soon began to realize that the town was not 
going ahead as rapidly as they had expected. The 
prices of real estate dropped, and prudent men per- 
ceived that, while it had gained a large population with 
startling facility, there were grave reasons for appre- 
hending that it would not continue at the same rate of 
progress, and possibly that the population would remain 
stationary. All attempts to convert the port into a 
commercial centre have proved futile. La Plata lacks 
business and industrial resources. The civil service 
of the Provincial Government cannot take the place 
of an enterprising mercantile element in developing the 
trade of the city. 



98 TROPICAL AISIERICA 

While the Argentine people seem to have what every 
other Latin- American race except the Chilian lacks, — 
something of the Anglo-Saxon energy and reserve of 
power, — they are easily infatuated with specious or vis- 
ionary schemes. The imposing array of stately build- 
ings and harbor works where ten years ago was a tract 
of pasturage ground with swamps stretching seaward is 
a monument to the enterprise of the nation ; but there 
was lamentable lack of judgment in the attempt to 
found a rival capital and commercial metropolis so 
near Buenos Ayres. Neither the city nor the port was 
needed, and the millions expended upon a grandiose 
project, which enriched a small group of politicians, 
adventurers, and land speculators, might have been used 
more wisely. Bahia Blanca would have been a superior 
site, since it lies at the head of a good harbor and com- 
mands the growing trade of the Rio Negro region and 
of Patagonia. These lands, acquired by conquest over 
Indian tribes and by a convention with Chili, are 
gradually filling up with settlers and assuming com- 
mercial importance. Bahia Blanca is growing rapidly, 
and promises to become the chief business centre on the 
southern coast. If the provincial seat of government 
had been located there, and if the same outlay had been 
expended on public works and buildings, its commer- 
cial resources would have contributed to its progress. 
The establishment of a second metropolis at La Plata 
seemed an impossible undertaking and for that very 
reason fascinated the imaginations of the projectors. 

When one witnesses the extraordinary commercial 
activity of the metropolis of the Argentine Republic, 
he finds it easy to believe anything that he may hear 
respecting the industrial resources and development of 



ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 99 

the country wliich lies behind it. An overland journey 
is almost an essential safeguard against overweening 
credulity. After a prolonged stay at Buenos Ayres and 
La Plata, I set out for the Andes and Chili, halting at 
the chief towns on the way. Travelling expenses in 
the Argentine range with the hotel bills under the gen- 
eral conditions of inflated prices. An exception is to 
be made with reference to baggage, which is checked 
without extra charge to one's destination. In Brazil 
and Chili the transfer of baggage by train costs a third 
or at least a quarter of the ordinary passenger fare; but 
on Argentine railways the American system is adopted, 
with limitations of weight. The cars are not luxu- 
rious, but fairly comfortable, and the train service is 
good. Coffee is served on the night trains and early 
in the morning, and at the restaurant stations break- 
fasts and dinners of seven or eight courses are pro- 
vided, wine being included. One has to pay roundly 
in cheap money for these privileges of wayside refresh- 
ment, but he cannot complain of being hurried. There 
is an ample allowance of time for breakfast or dinner, 
and the most deliberate traveller can finish his coffee 
and smoke a cigarette before there are any signs of 
commotion on the platform. 

The railway to Rosario leads up the Parand, which 
with the Plate forms the riverine boundary of the prov- 
ince of Buenos Ayres. In territorial extent, popula- 
tion, wealth, and agricultural resources this is the 
Empire State of the Argentine; yet it seems an empty 
and undeveloped land as one approaches its northern 
frontier. Villages are infrequent; farm houses are 
small and unpretentious; and there are few signs of 
agricultural activity. The province is an unbroken 



100 TROPICAL AMERICA 

plain, nearly 121,000 English square miles in extent. 
Rapid as the movement of immigration has been during 
the last decade, even the most populous State has vast 
tracts of unoccupied land and its cultivated sections 
appear untenanted. The Argentine can support a pop- 
ulation a hundred times as great as it now has, and it 
will not then seem crowded. In 1875 there were 
825,492 acres cultivated, and in 1890 there were 5,899,- 
895 acres, mainly in wheat. Amazing as the ratio of 
increase is, there is only one per cent of the entire area 
under tillage. The traveller who passes an afternoon 
on the road between Buenos Ayres and Rosario finds it 
hard to believe that this is the centre of the pastoral 
industries of the Argentine. In 1888 there were 
70,000,000 sheep and 23,000,000 cattle in the country, 
and more than one-half of the stock was in the prov- 
ince of Buenos Ayres. 

At Rosario I found a comfortable English hotel, an 
excellent club frequented by foreign residents, and a 
thriving rather than an attractive city. It has been 
rapidly built, and contains few structures of architect- 
ural merit. There is a well-shaded plaza, with a large 
church, and there are 2500 acres of shops and houses, 
with a few public buildings, banks, and ambitious ware- 
houses. The growth of Rosario is phenomenal even 
for a progressive country. In 1854 it had a population 
of 4300; in 1870, only 21,000; and now it has over 
70,000, being the second city of the Argentine. Its 
foreign trade has increased during the same period from 
14,000,000 to $80,000,000. English, French, Ger- 
man, Italian, and Belgian steamers now load and 
unload in its harbor. Rosario can never hope to rival 
Buenos Ayres, but it is destined to become a manu- 



ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 101 

facturing and shipping centre of great importance. 
It is making the most of its chances for competing 
with the metropolis. It is supplying all the appli- 
ances required for handling a great share of the export 
and import trade. It is one of our own spirited and 
wide-awake western cities, reduced to south latitude, 
painted in garish hues, of blue and yellow, and Euro- 
peanized in its habits and tastes. 

Rosario is the metropolis of the province of Santa 
F^, which has been the chief forcing-bed of those agri- 
cultural colonies to which the Argentine owes a large 
portion of its progress during the last twenty years. 
These colonies are communities of farms operated by 
Italian, Spanish, Swiss, or French immigrants. The 
National and Provincial Governments have vied with 
each other in offering liberal terms to incoming immi- 
grants. Everything has been done to draw Europeans 
from the overcrowded countries of the Mediterranean 
into the pampas. During 1889 free transportation was 
offered, until the swarming of paupers and the blind 
compelled a halt. In every modern tongue the Argen- 
tine has been proclaimed to be the Eden and the El 
Dorado of the New World. Immigrants have been 
welcomed from every quarter, and they have been 
allowed to retain their national characteristics and race 
sympathies in settlements or communities where their 
own language is spoken. The colonies have been at 
once popular with new settlers who desired to live 
among those of their own race and tongue, and suc- 
cessful as land speculations. No more effective ex- 
pedient for stimulating immigration has ever been 
devised. 

Admirable as the enterprise of the Argentine nation 



102 TEOPICAL AMERICA 

has been in developing the resources of an unoccupied 
domain by the establishment of colonies and systematic 
encouragement of immigration, it is necessary to qual- 
ify praise with condemnation of the speculative spirit 
in which these processes have been conducted. The 
government has not adopted the American system of 
dividing the public land into 'tracts and selling the 
smallest subdivision of a section at a fixed price per 
acre. It has sold land at auction by the square league, 
or by blocks of several hundreds of leagues. The gov- 
ernment confined its transactions to Argentine specu- 
lators and foreign capitalists, who would be left to deal 
with the immigrants and to induce them to purchase at 
high rates on credit. The system by which landowners 
were enabled to have their estates appraised and then 
to obtain cedulas from the mortgage banks for one-half 
the valuation has not aided immigrants, but on the 
contrary has stimulated reckless land speculation. 
Before the collapse of Argentine credit, settlers who 
had been in the country for ten or fifteen years seemed 
to have a share in the artificial prosperity of the infla- 
tion period. Their own holdings had doubled in value, 
and if the cost of living was very high every bushel of 
wheat and every pound of wool which they sold was 
never worth less than its real value in gold and its 
equivalent in depreciated paper. Those who had re- 
cently entered the field and had paid high prices for 
their land, running heavily into debt for it, had no 
compensations for inflation prices. In the evolution of 
wise finance, when the currency of the country is con- 
tracted, the issues of cedulas suspended, and the gold 
basis restored, the old settlers will inevitably find that 
much of their vaunted progress is fictitious, and with 



ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 103 

the shrinkage in prices the Argentine may be once 
more a good field for immigrants. 

From Rosario I took a night train for Cordova to get 
a glimpse of the medii3eval in South American Yankee- 
lands. That quaint city, founded by Cabrera in 1573, 
was the chief seat of Jesuit learning in South America 
for two centuries. A university was established in the 
town as early as 1613. A printing-press was set in 
motion, and the first books published on the eastern 
side of the Andes were edited and revised by learned 
Jesuit priests connected with the college. Cordova has 
not lost the aspect of an old Spanish town. La Plata 
has been built within ten years; Rosario, after a lan- 
guishing existence for 150 years, is now a flourishing 
centre of commercial enterprise; and Buenos Ayres 
with all its vicissitudes of fortune and financial reverses 
remains the marvel of the southern hemisphere. The 
coast cities belong to the present age of intense vital- 
ity and speculative industrial development. Cordova 
is a relic of mediaeval learning and religion and seems 
out of place in an Argentine of mercantile bustle and 
financial vagaries. 

My first stroll in Cordova revealed a city of antique 
churches, time-worn and battered towers, and blackened 
domes. Fronting on the central plaza stood the cathe- 
dral with its oriental fagade, double towers, and mas- 
sive dome. The interior was cold and bare, but I had 
seen nothing in South America more picturesque than 
this grim, battlemented pile, built as if its founders 
meant it to be a stronghold of historic faith. Not far 
away was the Jesuit church with medallion paintings 
of the chief saints of the order, and a ceiling of carved 
cedar reputed to have been pieced together without 



104 TROPICAL AMERICA 

hammer or screw. The Jesuit missionaries here, as in 
Paraguay, taught the native converts to be expert wood- 
carvers, and this is one of the oldest samples of their 
work. The metal with which it is ornamented came 
from Peru. The art may be crude and the shabby 
building itself sorely in need of repairs, but when one 
has seen hundreds of bad copies of Renaissance churches 
of southern Europe, an honest bit of mediaeval archi- 
tecture has the effect of a startling, albeit agreeable, 
surprise. There are a dozen other crumbling churches, 
monasteries, and convents, filled with bad painting and 
black with cobwebs and dust. 

There were signs of the outbreak of a restoration 
mania in the ecclesiastical structures. Decorators were 
at work in several churches, and new tones of color 
contrasted strangely with the faded paintings and time- 
stained altars. Medisevalism, while venerable and 
picturesque, has its disadvantages. Cordova suffers in 
a material sense from having the reputation of being 
old and musty. The florid modern architecture of the 
new public buildings is a loud protest against reaction- 
ary tendencies which have retarded its progress. Ornate 
as these handsome structures are, they are not to be 
compared for grace and beauty with the old Moorish 
cabildo adjoining the cathedral. That has simplicity 
and symmetry in keeping with the general lines of 
architecture of an antiquated Spanish town. The 
university is as quaint as either the cathedral or the 
cabildo. It occupies a quadrangle and while revealing 
the ravages of time is stately and impressive. On one 
side is the graduation hall with a full-length portrait 
of the worthy bishop who founded the college early 
in the seventeenth century, exhausting his private for- 



ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 105 

tune in his zeal for good letters. ■ The class-rooms are 
spacious cloisters approached from a flight of marble 
steps. It was the summer vacation, and I could not tell 
how large were the swarms of students rifling the honey 
of wisdom from the flower of learning. There was a 
chemical laboratory well stocked with apparatus, and 
I learned that a staff of German professors was ordi- 
narily employed in teaching natural science. 

From Cordova I hastened on to the Andes. A rail- 
way ride of 480 miles carried me across the pampas to 
the gateways of the Andes. From east to west there 
was a sea of green, discolored and turgid where there 
were shoals of weeds and thistles, and more vivid in hue 
where the soil was deep and rich. The long white tufts 
of pampa grass had the effect of waves, especially when 
the wind blew in furious gusts. Here and there ap- 
peared a weather-beaten barn like the sail of a Brazilian 
catamaran ; far away were sighted the masts of poplars 
swaying with the wind-, and a tiny puff of smoke 
rose from a distant farm-house as from the funnel of a 
freighter at sea. At the close of day, as the wind fresh- 
ened into a gale, the billows of coarse grass seemed to 
break into yellow foam, and the trees to bend under the 
weight of leafy canvas, like vessels in distress. It was 
a trick of imagination that transformed the scene and 
imparted adventitious interest to a monotonous prospect 
by suggesting an ocean vista. Those broad stretches 
of tangled and luxuriant grass had neither beauty nor 
charm of their own. The ocean is infinite in variety 
and never dull. The midsummer pampas can never be 
anything but wearisome. 

In the earlier stages of this journey long files of pop- 
lars were often seen and clumps of willows in marshy 



106 TROPICAL AMERICA 

spots along the banks of streams ; but beyond the rail- 
way junction at Villa Maria the wide circuit of the 
horizon could be swept with a glass without a glimpse 
of trees or human habitation. The pampas are seen at 
their best early in the spring when the verdure is fresh, 
but it is not long before the levels are broken by thistles 
which grow to great height. These blossom about 
Christmas time, and throughout January the air is thick 
with floating thistle-down. Then these rank weeds 
droop and fall away, and as winter approaches and the 
drought passes the grass levels are again green. For 
a week before I left Cordova the weather had been 
sultry and sweltering; but in the early morning at 
Villa Maria, I suffered intensely from cold while I was 
waiting for a connecting train. Fifty Italian immi- 
grants lay on the station floor mummied in blankets, and 
so benumbed with cold that they ceased to chatter in 
the language of their sunny land. The pampero, with 
its chill breath, was blowing the foam of the thistle- 
down over the grassy plains. It is a cold but invigo- 
rating wind, and tempers the inclement heat of mid- 
summer. 

The country between Cordova and Mendoza reveals 
few signs of that phenomenal prosperity which statisti- 
cians like Mr. Mulhall demonstrate with facility. The 
farmhouses are either thatched huts or dilapidated 
hovels; the barns are small; orchards are insignificant 
clumps; and the villages and towns are forlorn and 
desolate. Villa Maria, Rio Cuarto, and Villa Mercedes 
are towns which have been linked together by costly 
lines of railway. Their names are printed in large 
letters on the railway maps, but when the train draws 
up at the stations their insignificance is disclosed. San 



ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 107 

Luis is the capital of a province ; but it is a neglected 
cluster of adobe huts. At La Paz I caught a glimpse 
of Tupungato, one of the great peaks of the Andes, a 
mountain 22,100 feet high. The pampas had been 
passed and the hill country of Mendoza had been 
entered. From Santa Rosa westward there were con- 
tinuous lines of poplars and meadows artificially 
watered where the cattle looked sleek and fat. As 
Mendoza was approached comfortable farmhouses were 
seen for the first time during this long railway ride, 
and vineyards and orchards gave promise of a rich fruit- 
growing region. 

Mendoza is at once an old and a new town. It was 
founded by Spaniards from Chili in 1559, and it was 
destroyed by an earthquake in 1861, The streets are 
broad and lined with black-walnut and handsome shade 
trees. There are numerous parks with a fine display of 
foliage and flowers. There are signs of thrift and com- 
fort everywhere, except in the hotels which are ex- 
tremely bad. There is a population "of 35,000, which 
is" rapidly increasing in consequence of emigration from 
Chili. The town standing near the entrance to the 
Uspallata Pass, the highroad over the mountains, 
already is the chief centre of trade with the Western 
Republic. Every day during the summer months long 
trains of pack-mules are set in motion over the Andes. 
The mountaineer, with his poncho, or shawl-cape, the 
first characteristic South American garment which I 
had seen in the course of a long journey, is a familiar 
figure in the streets. The tinkle of the mule-bell and 
the crack of the muleteer's whip may be heard at any 
hour of the day on the highroad leading to the Para- 
millos. It is a flourishing transportation trade that 



108 TROPICAL AMERICA 

will be ruined when the Trans-Andean Railway is 
completed. 

This is one of the most ambitious railway projects in 
South America. It is designed to furnish direct com- 
munication between Valparaiso and Buenos Ayres by a 
railway crossing the Cordilleras at an elevation of over 
10,000 feet above sea level. The original surveys out- 
lined a forty-inch gauge from Mendoza to Santa Rosa 
de Los Andes, a distance of 159 miles through Uspal- 
lata Pass, and contemplated an expenditure of $9,000,- 
000 in gold. The survey and estimates have been 
repeatedly readjusted, and the probable cost of the rail- 
way is now anybody's guess. The Argentine and 
Chilian Governments are supporting this costly trans- 
continental enterprise, which will probably be com- 
pleted and in operation by 1895. The first section 
follows the Mendoza River to Punta de las Vacas, a 
distance of 94 miles, with a rise of one in every one 
hundred feet. Thence to the entrance of the tunnel of 
the Cumbre, or siimmit of the Cordillera, there will be 
a rise of one in thirty-eight feet for twenty-five miles. 
The tunnel will be over two miles long, and a mag- 
nificent engineering work. The descent from the 
western mouth of the tunnel will be very steep to Tam- 
billos. River Juncal, and Santa Rosa, the ratio for a 
portion of the distance being one in five feet. The 
tunnel and the curving inclines on the Chilian side are 
the difficult portions of the work. The Argentine 
section while it has been built with facility will be 
exposed to freshets in the Uspallata gorge, and grave 
doubts are entertained respecting the practicability of 
adequately protecting the railway. My subsequent 
observations in crossing the mountains by the Uspallata 



ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 109 

convinced me that a considerable portion of the railway 
will have to be regraded and rebuilt. Henry Meiggs 
would never have tolerated the sharp curves and steep 
grades which are to be seen on this railway, nor would 
he have underrated the risks from floods in the mighty 
gorge of the Mendoza, as the engineers have done for 
the sake of cheapening the cost of construction. 

The railway system of the Argentine, of which the 
Trans-Andean will be the connecting link with the 
Pacific lines, is the main source of its recent progress. 
By the official returns published in 1889 it consisted of 
4841 miles in operation, 599 under construction, and 
2744 under survey. These lines carried 8,373,500 
passengers and 3,950,000 tons of freight in 1888, and 
7,173,500 passengers and 3,866,523 tons of freight in 
1887. This was a large business for a country with a 
population of 4,000,000. Nearly all these roads have 
been built under government guarantees at extravagant 
cost. The provincial legislatures, as well as the Na- 
tional Government, have been prevailed upon to assist 
new railway enterprises, and a large amount of in- 
debtedness has been rolled up in this way. The Argen- 
tine people have had implicit faith in railway extension 
as a means of attracting immigrants and developing 
agricultural resources. In a new country roads of some 
kind must be provided, and steam railways are con- 
sidered a better investment than public highways. 
Heavy burdens have been assumed by the various 
governments; but the best of these enterprises are on 
a self-sustaining basis, and some of them have been 
paying dividends. In 1889 the National Government 
declared that it would not grant any additional favors 
to railway companies; but as soon as Congress met 



110 TROPICAL AMERICA 

several new lines were sanctioned, and interest on their 
bonds was guaranteed. The financial embarrassments 
of the nation involved before the close of the year 
a suspension of all public works except the Trans- 
Andean and a few railways under construction in the 
interior. In 1890 arrangements were made with rail- 
way contractors to limit construction to the completion 
of a few lines and branches which were nearly ready to 
be turned over to the public service. In 1891 all the 
railway corporations suffered from the paralysis of the 
industrial resources of the country, and the virtual 
bankruptcy of the national and provincial treasuries, 
so that the extension and completion of the system 
were indefinitely deferred. 

"While the rate of railway progress has been markedly 
in advance of the practical requirements of the country, 
the financial embarrassments are to be attributed to 
other causes. The wonderful progress of the nation 
has been largely promoted by railway enterprise, and 
when the period of business stagnation and disorder 
comes to an end the system will probably be found a 
remunerative investment. The Argentine has in its 
railways all the facilities for rapid transportation and 
industrial development which will be required for 
another generation. It is a system which not only 
opens all the provinces to European settlement, but 
reaches out in the north toward the fertile plateau of 
Bolivia and westward to the Pacific. My own ob- 
servations extended to five of the principal railways, 
and I found little to criticise and much to admire in 
the general management of these lines. I carried my 
baggage checked on the American plan, from Buenos 
Ayres to Mendoza, via Rosario, Cordova, and Villa 



ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 111 

Maria, and had it delivered promptly at the terminus ; 
and at no point in the course of 1200 miles of railway- 
travel in the Argentine did I suffer from detention or 
accident. 

What is true of railway capital and management 
applies also to public works, harbor improvements, 
banking institutions, and commercial enterprises of all 
kinds. English money has gone into everything, and 
ordinarily large returns, in dividends and profits, have 
been received. The Argentine has been largely cre- 
ated and developed by English enterprise and invest- 
ments. If it has gone too far in railway building, 
land speculation, immigration measures, cedula expan- 
sion, overtrading in imports, and currency inflation, 
the responsibility for temporary disorder of the finances 
largely rests with English capitalists, who have been 
ready to float every projected enterprise offering prom- 
ise of high percentages of interest. 

The inflation of the currency was the chief cause of 
the financial disorders. The government after legaliz- 
ing the suspension of specie payments by the banks, and 
making their paper issues a legal tender for debts and 
customs, passed a free banking law. The banks were 
required to deposit with the national bank 85 per cent 
of gold as a guarantee of the redemption of new issues ; 
but at the end of two years the gold could be withdrawn 
for the reduction of the foreign debt. The banks in 
depositing gold received bonds which they exchanged 
for notes of issue. The volume of currency was in- 
creased from $60,000,000 to $160,000,000 in a short 
period. Many of the banks, with the connivance of 
the administration, deposited promises to pay gold in 
place of the coin itself, and issued paper on the strength 



112 TROPICAL AMERICA 

of bonds illegally obtained. One bank obtained a 
credit for $1,275,000 of gold without having a dollar 
on deposit, and on the strength of this fictitious capi- 
tal was converted into a paper mill for the manufacture 
of money. All the paper money was nominally guar- 
anteed by gold bonds ; but these never represented more 
than 160, 000, 000 in actual coin. At least $100, 000, 000 
was guaranteed by paper alone. As time went on 
these issues exceeded $250,000,000. This inflation 
movement followed a long period of persistent over- 
trading, by which the market was overstocked with 
European manufactures, and gold was drained out of 
it in the Settlement of balances of trade created by 
excessive importations. 

Simultaneously there were mortgage bonds known as 
cedulas on which interest was guaranteed either by the 
National or by the Provisional Government. Under the 
land-borrowing laws the owner of a stock-farm or tract 
of territory could obtain from mortgage banks cedulas 
to the amount of one-half of the valuation of his prop- 
erty. These he could sell in the market for what he 
could get for them. The country was flooded with 
these depreciated bonds. The two leading mortgage 
banks increased their issues of cedulas from $275,- 
000,000 in 1887 to $514,000,000 in 1889, and the pro- 
vincial banks added largely to the volume. Cedulas 
became a popular European investment. The system 
stimulated land speculation, artificially raised the value 
of farms, and intensified the evils of inflation at a 
period when the indebtedness of the nation, the prov- 
inces, and the capital had risen from $322,596,544 to 
$574,068,446 at the beginning of 1889. The nation 
had contracted its debt mainly for the construction of 



ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 113 

railways and public works. The provinces had been 
bonded for similar enterprises, and for the purchase of 
national securities to be used by their own banks as a 
basis for paper issues. 

From 1887 to 1889 the inflation of the currency pro- 
duced speculative activity such as was never before 
known in Spanish America. Then came an inexplica- 
ble reaction, when every stock operator began to look 
about for gold and to hoard it. One day it was an- 
nounced that the directors of the national bank had 
decided to pass a dividend. Gold began to rise by 
leaps and bounds, and stocks of all kinds fell like 
rocket-sticks. The finance minister concluded with 
singular fatuity that the high premiums were caused by 
scarcity of gold, and that all that it was necessary to do 
in order to restore paper money to par was to throw 
$50,000,000 of the government's coin reserve into the 
market. The gold brokers fought over it like wolves, 
and wanted what remained in the treasury. Passing 
from one folly to another, the government issued a 
decree prohibiting brokers from making public sales of 
gold or from quoting the price on the stock board. 
This ended the career of Finance Minister Varela, and 
Dr. Pacheco, the author of the Free Banking Bill, was 
recalled to office. He at once reopened the bolsa to 
gold transactions, and submitted two bills to the cham- 
bers for contracting the paper currency, which were 
immediately passed. One of these measures gradually 
withdrew 141,000,000 of notes of the national bank by 
monthly surrenders up to June 1, 1891. The other 
law decreed the reduction of other bank issues after 
that date, until the total volume of the paper currency 
should not exceed $100, 000, 000. 



114 TROPICAL AMERICA 

These measures slightly raised in February, 1890, 
when I was in the Argentine, the value of the paper 
dollar, which had been worth only forty-five cents. If 
this contraction movement could have been continued 
without interruption there would have been a gradual 
shrinkage of prices, and an equilibrium between gold 
and paper would have been finally established. But 
there were too many corrupt officials and political 
adventurers interested in the revival of stock specula- 
tion to permit the continuance of conservative financial 
methods. Gold again began to rise in March, and 
before the revolution of July, 1890, there was a general 
panic. Blind confidence was converted into absolute 
distrust. President Pellegrini subsequently compared 
the situation to the overwrought condition of an army 
when a single gunshot suffices to produce general con- 
fusion and defeat. A credulous nation was trans- 
formed into a nation of panic-mongers, doubting the 
solvency of the banks and forcing them to suspend 
business, hoarding gold and sending it higher and 
higher, and ready in a spirit of moral depression and 
madness to believe that there were greater depths of 
despondency into which all were doomed to plunge. 

One of the statisticians published in a daily journal, 
while I was in Buenos Ayres, a comparative exhibit of 
the expenditures for brass bands and schools in the 
interior provinces of the Argentine. In San Luis the 
bands cost as much as the schools, and in Rioja nearly 
four times as much. Even in provinces, where the 
governors were paid the smallest salaries, there was 
always an elastic margin in the annual budgets for 
appropriations for brass bands. In all the Argentine 
towns there were open-air concerts afternoon and even- 



ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 115 

ing attended by throngs of saunterers. So long as the 
j)opulace was entertained by brass bands, it was readily 
induced to believe that government was by and for the 
people. While the Argentines made a business of 
politics and talked of nothing else, they bestowed little 
thought upon their institutions and their relations as 
citizens. The political cabals governed and the people 
were kept in good humor and constantly amused. That 
was where the brass band came in. It was political 
government reduced to a system. of practical simplicity. 
The Argentine constitutional system in its outward 
form corresponds closely to that of the United States. 
The States have elective governors of their own, and 
are each represented in the upper house by two sena- 
tors chosen for nine years. The members of the lower 
house are elected on the basis of population for four 
years. The President- is chosen by an electoral college. 
He appoints his own cabinet and wields unrestricted 
executive authority. There is a supreme court mod- 
elled after the judiciary of the United States. The 
American constitution is reproduced in south latitude, 
but the inward grace of enlightened public opinion is 
lacking, and political practice falls below the level of a 
self-governing democracy. Congress enacts laws, but 
the President as commander-in-chief of the army, and 
as the head of a civil service dependent upon his will 
and caprice, possesses absolute authority in administra- 
tion. The country is governed by executive decrees 
rather than b}^ constitutional laws. Elections are 
carried by military pressure and manipulation of the 
civil service. While the President is ineligible for 
re-election after holding office for six years, he controls 
the choice of his successor. President Roca virtually 



116 TROPICAL AMERICA 

nominated and elected his brother-in-law, Juarez Cai- 
man, as his successor. President Juarez set his heart 
upon controlling the succession in the interest of one 
of his relatives, a prominent official; but was forced 
to retire before he could carry out his purpose. The 
Plate countries have been accustomed since the revolt 
against Spain to the periodical assumption of absolute 
power by generals and dictators, and are not startled 
by a close approach to political dictatorship in execu- 
tive administration. 

Nothing in the Argentine surprised me more than 
the boldness and freedom with which the press attacked 
the government of the day and exposed its corruption. 
Every morning some fresh public scandal was brought 
to light, and ministers were arraigned for venality and 
incompetence. The New York press in the days of the 
Tweed exposures did not bristle with more vehement 
denunciations of official corruption than these Argen- 
tine journals. It was a singular phenomenon which 
could hardly fail to impress a foreign observer. The 
government paid no heed to these attacks. Ministers 
did not trouble themselves to repel charges affecting 
their integrity. The public was apathetic and inclined 
to believe that the newspapers were making a great 
ado about nothing. Apparently there was no political 
party benefiting by these assaults from an opposition 
press, unless there was an attempt to revive the old- 
time feeling of jealousy between the national capital 
and the confederated provinces. President Juarez being 
a native of Cordova and disliked by the PorteSos, or 
inhabitants of Buenos Ayres. The attitude of the 
administration toward these censors and scandal- 
mongers was one of undisguised contempt. Ministers 



ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 117 

seemed to be asking, with cynical amusement, Tweed's 
old question, "What are you going to do about it?" 
Meanwhile, public jobbery, trading in concessions, 
illegal banking issues, and official immorality went on 
without restraint. 

This wholesome criticism from an independent press 
had one important effect. It gave direction to public 
opinion in the capital, and involved the organization 
of the Uni6n Civica. If the country had not been on 
the verge of a financial revulsion, there might not have 
been the revolt against the Juarez administration in 
July, 1890; but with ruin and disaster confronting 
them, men turned against the President whose incom- 
petence and venality would have been condoned if the 
times had been good. The Uni6n Civica was founded 
when the government was charged with maladministra- 
tion in sanctioning an illegal issue of $40,000,000 of 
paper money. A mass-meeting held one Sunday was 
the largest concourse of citizens which had ever assem- 
bled in the Plate countries. A second mass-meeting 
involved the reorganization of the ministry, and the 
appointment of Dr. Uriburii as Minister of the Treasury. 
There was a brief interval during which futile attempts 
were made to introduce financial reforms, and then Dr. 
Uriburii became disheartened, and resigned office. 
Secret conferences followed between the leaders of the 
Uni6n Civica, General Campos, and several naval com- 
manders. The government was suddenly confronted 
with an armed coalition of the best battalions of the 
army, the entire navy, and the Union Civica. 

The manifesto issued by the Revolutionary Junta 
was a terrible arraignment of the political crimes of the 
Juarez Government. Liberal institutions were declared 



118 TROPICAL AMERICA 

to have disappeared. There was neither republic, nor 
federation, nor representative government, nor admin- 
istration, nor morality. Political life had become a 
money-making industry. The President had taken 
bribes from anybod}'^ having dealings with the nation, 
had joined syndicates organized for vast speculations 
dependent upon his official influence, had amassed a 
fortune at the expense of the State, and had corrupted 
the consciences of innumerable friends. Avarice had 
been his inspiration, jobbery his occupation. He had 
debauched the administration of the nation, suppressed 
the representative system, and brought the country to 
the verge of bankruptcy. Secret emissions of cur- 
rency had been authorized in order that the national 
bank might pay false dividends, because official specu- 
lators had bought up most of the shares. Commercial 
deposits and the savings of the working classes had 
been distributed among a circle of politicians, living 
in luxury and gambling with millions which were not 
their own. More than $50,000,000 in gold, the pro- 
ceeds of the sale of public bonds deposited with the 
government by the new guaranteed banks, had been 
thrown into the whirlpool of speculation. The State 
railways were sold to reduce the public debt, and the 
funds thus secured were misapplied. The sanitary 
works were sold under the shadow of a colossal scandal. 
The guaranteed banks had exhausted their credit in 
false issues, and a paper currency had been illegally 
increased $35,000,000 when gold was quoted at 300, 
and $100,000,000 more paper money had been disguised 
under the name of mortgage bonds. These were the 
principal counts in the indictment framed by the Uni6n 
Civica in justification of the popular uprising against 



ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 119 

the most corrupt administration ever known in the 
annals of misgoverned South America. 

The revolution opened with every prospect of success. 
It failed from the incapacity of the leaders to co-operate 
harmoniously. On July 19, 1890, the defection of the 
army was discovered. On July 26 the revolt broke out. 
For four days there was bloodshed without definite plan 
or purpose. No determined attack was made upon the 
government palace. The fleet opened a fantastic bom- 
bardment upon the suburbs. There was inexplicable 
mismanagement of the insurgent forces, and on July 
29 an ignominious surrender to the government with a 
proclamation of general amnesty. General Roca re- 
mained behind the scenes, apparently master of the 
situation, while President Juarez had fled to a place of 
refuge on the Rosario railway, and two factions of the 
army were playing at cross purposes, and the police and 
the volunteers of the Union Civica were shooting 
women and children in the streets. Another week of 
hopeless confusion passed, and General Roca announced 
the resignation of President Juarez and,the succession 
of vice-President Pellegrini. Then the city was illu- 
minated, and for three days there was a pandemonium 
of popular rejoicing over a victory which nobody except 
General Roca understood. The Union Civica assum- 
ing after its defeat the credit for a victory due to Gen- 
eral Roca's dexterity and common sense, became a 
national organization with branches in every town. 
It was not long before it was rent into two factions, 
and playing into the hands of General Roca and the 
autonomists. 

In June, 1891, the deplorable state of Argentine 
finance was revealed in a luminous statement made by 



120 TROPICAL AMERICA 

President Pellegrini. The interest service on the 
national debt had been suspended for three years under 
a general arrangement made with the English creditors. 
All public works requiring payments from the treasury 
had been abandoned with a few exceptions subject to 
special contracts. Large reductions had been made in 
the budget of expenditures and the civil service. All 
business interests were stagnant. Immigration had 
been diverted to Brazil. All efforts to restore public 
confidence by legislation or financial combinations had 
failed, and the government was making a hopeless 
attempt to raise 130,000,000 by a tariff which bore 
heavily upon consumers. The imports had declined 
and the revenues with them. All industries were pros- 
trated except politics, and the pernicious activity dis- 
played by factions was an evil augury for the return of 
prosperity. There was a collapse of luxurious living 
in the Argentine capital. The dandies were content to 
wear their old clothes. Showy equipages disappeared 
from Palermo. Costly furniture was emptied from 
palaces into auction-rooms. Family jewels were in 
the pawn-shops, many of the speculators were forced 
to leave the scene of their prolonged financial debauch, 
and to retire to the farms where they had grown up in 
poverty. 

The Argentines consider themselves the Yankees of 
the southern hemisphere ; but they lack both the practi- 
cal judgment and moral qualities of the New England 
stock. In the order of historical settlement their coun- 
try is old; but in the existing stage of political and 
industrial development it is new. The revolt of the 
Argentine provinces against Spain, in 1810, was fol- 
lowed by a sterile period of civil war, military dictator- 



ACROSS THE AEGENTINE 121 

ship, and disunion. It was not until 1861, when the 
federal republic was reconstituted under the leadership 
of Buenos Ayres, that a new era of progressive activity 
opened. For twenty years jealousies were excited by 
rival aspirations for the seat of the National Govern- 
ment, and it was not until 1881, when the city was 
selected as the capital, that the danger of disunion and 
a renewal of civil war was averted. During thirty 
years the country has trebled its population, its in- 
crease being relatively much more rapid than that of 
the United States during the same period. The esti- 
mate of the present population is 4,000,000 in place of 
1,160,000 in 1857. Immigration has swept up the 
Plate like a mighty incoming tide during the last dec- 
ade, and the pampas have been filled with European 
settlers. A wheat belt of enormous extent was opened 
for agriculture. The exports of wool, flour, hides, jerked 
beef, and other staples, increased from $26,000,000 in 
1871 to $100,000,000 in 1888, while the importations 
rose from $44,000,000 to $128,000,000, and the foreign 
carrying trade from 1, 114, 000 to 4, 885, 147 tons. Thou- 
sands of miles of railway were constructed; public 
works of stupendous magnitude were undertaken; 
schools were opened in all the provinces; and, in a 
single generation, the Argentine people made a record 
for industrial progress which could not be equalled in 
Spanish America. 

The ruin wrought in this wonderful country is to be 
attributed to blemishes in the national character which 
were aggravated by the credulity and cupidity of Eng- 
lish investors. The Argentines, lacking original force 
themselves, have been the most imitative people in the 
southern hemisphere. They borrowed all their politi- 



122 TROPICAL AMERICA 

cal ideas from the American constitution without 
adapting them to the peculiar conditions of their own 
civilization. They looked upon immigration as the 
main source of wealth of the northern republic, and 
succeeded in diverting a considerable share of the sur- 
plus population of Southern Europe to the Plate. As 
the development of the United States had been promoted 
by railway construction, they undertook to anticipate 
the requirements of their own country by costly public 
works conducted in the most extravagant way. They 
seemed to be rivalling the Yankees in material prog- 
ress, and English investors, tempted by the high rates 
of interest, supplied them with financial resources for 
every premature undertaking and reckless enterprise. 
The Argentines were speedily intoxicated with their 
own success. They ceased to do anything for them- 
selves. The Italians were the laborers in town and 
country, and it was unnecessary for a native to work. 
The great agricultural staples could be produced in 
the interior by foreigners, and all manufactures could 
be imported from England, France, and Germany where 
there was cheap labor. Manufacturing industries were 
not required in the Argentine. It was easier to import 
everything from Europe, to derive a great revenue from 
high duties for the support of the government, and to 
equalize exchanges by exporting the products of Italian 
labor on the pampas. The function of the Argentine 
was to govern the country, to speculate in land and 
stocks, and to live in luxurious ease. So long as 
immigrants flocked into the country by the thousand, 
and English capital was drawn in by the million, all 
went well. The collapse came when the borrowing 
powers of the nation ceased altogether through exces- 



ACROSS THE ARGENTINE 123 

sive issues of paper money and utter demoralization of 
financial administration. Then in their extremity, 
when their speculative bubbles were pricked, they 
turned and upbraided the English investors for teach- 
ing them to be extravagant, and for foolishly lending 
money to them without examining the securities. 

Disastrous as the results of political government and 
financial disorder have been in the Argentine, its ulti- 
mate recovery by slow stages is probable. It has a 
magnificent railway system, an industrious working 
population recruited from Europe, and nearly all the 
material appliances for progress. It ranks after Brazil 
as the second nation in South America in territorial 
extent. It has fourteen States, with a combined area 
of 515,000 miles, and nine territorial provinces, which 
swell the national domain to 1,125,086 miles, or less 
than one-third of the extent of the United States with 
Alaska included. It is a country with varied agricul- 
tural resources. In the northern provinces sugar and 
cotton can be raised. Along the Cordilleras there is 
a fruit-growing region equal to Southern California. 
In the central and southern provinces there is a wheat 
tract of enormous extent, where prolific crops can be 
raised, and there are wide reaches of pampas where 
sheep and cattle can be pastured under the most favora- 
ble conditions. The northern forests abound in cabinet 
woods, and there is native salt all along the south coast, 
with seas fairly alive with fish. It is an industrial 
empire too rich in natural resources, and it has too large 
a population of European workmen, to be permanently 
ruined by a financial collapse without a parallel in the 
history of nations. The Argentine stock is destined to 
disappear, and a hybrid European ized race will take 



124 TROPICAL AMERICA 

its place. Under new social and political conditions 
prosperity will be laboriously regained. Whatever the 
future may have in store for the Argentine, its recent 
experience does not justif}'- the conclusion that it is 
ever safe for any nation to make agricultural industries 
its only resource, nor to be brought into relations of 
absolute dependence upon foreign capital and manu- 
factures, nor to engross its energies with politics, to 
the exclusion of everything else. 



VII 

THE HEART OF THE ANDES 

A PICTUKESQUE BUT MENDACIOUS GUIDE — MULE KIDE 
THROUGH USPALLATA — AN ATTACK OF SORKOCHE — FIRST 

GLIMPSE OF THE HIGHEST CORDILLERAS ASCENT OF 

THE CUMBRE — ADVENTURES WITH A DRUNKEN GUIDE 

I HAD planned waiting in Mendoza several days until 
I could find a party of travellers destined for Chili. 
A poor breakfast, a worse dinner, and a glimpse of the 
sleeping room where I was to pass the night, induced a 
feeling of sheer desperation. A Chilian guide offered 
to start with me early in the morning for the Andes and 
Santa Rosa. In appearance he was as picturesque a 
ruffian as I ever saw off the lyric stage. He wore an 
Indian poncho, with red stripes and a blue ground, a 
sleeveless garment, at once a shawl and a cape, woven 
from the wool of the guanaco. A large scarlet hand- 
kerchief, loosely tied about his head, completed his 
resemblance to the brigand of melodrama. He took 
pains to explain that I would have good company, as 
an Englishman was going with him. As he said this 
his eyes rolled uneasily, and I knew that he was lying 
to me. But the hotel was irretrievably bad; inquiries 
for parties of travellers bound for the Andes had proved 
futile; and I was in hot haste to go on. I led the 

125 



126 TROPICAL AMERICA 

guide to the station in order to obtain the opinion of 
the railway officials, to whom I had presented letters of 
introduction from Buenos Ayres. I confided to them 
my misgivings respecting his honesty and trustworthi- 
ness. They questioned him closely, and pronounced 
him a safe man, especially as he was recommended at 
the hotel. This last consideration had little weight 
with me since I had eaten two vile meals there. Still 
I was glad to be reassured, and I was eager to cross 
the mountains. I clinched the bargain with the guide, 
and after ineffectual effort to obtain the address of 
the mysterious Englishman, procured supplies for the 
journey of five days. 

At daybreak the guide stalked into my room, told me 
that it was time to start, and before I was fairly awake 
had whipped up my trunk and carried it out where the 
pack-mule was standing. When I joined him a few 
minutes afterward he was nonchalantly smoking a 
cigarette and smiling blandly. The Englishman, who 
was to have gone with us, had suddenly changed his 
plans ; but there was another traveller who was to join 
us two miles up the road. This was the guide's ex- 
planation of the absence of the expected travelling 
companion. Evidently the Englishman was a mj^thical 
personage conjured into transitory existence for the 
purpose of tricking me into planning the journey. 
Prudence dictated a halt until a more trustworthy guide 
could be procured, and American or English companions 
recruited. But I was weary of Mendoza and its foul 
posadas; and there was my mountain steed, saddled 
and waiting for me, with my baggage already on the 
back of the pack -mule. I lighted a cigarette, hesitated, 
stared at the guide, whistled "Yankee Doodle," and 



THE HEART OF THE ANDES 127 

started. We rode two or three miles to the outskirts 
of the city, and were joined by the other traveller, a 
Chilian muleteer, happily with a face that inspired 
confidence. Six mules were added to the three already 
saddled. After delay, caused by the readjustment of 
saddles and loads, we started for the Cordilleras, two 
Chilians who did not know a word of English, one 
American, whose Spanish was rudimentary, and nine 
mules, who understood the music of the tinkling bell 
fastened to the leader's neck. 

There are two Andean passes by which Chili may be 
reached from Mendoza. One is the Portillo leading 
toward Santiago, between the lofty summits of Tupun- 
gato and Maypu. The other is the Uspallata which 
follows the river Mendoza to its sources in the heart of 
the Andes, and the Aconcagua and other mountain tor- 
rents from the central summit to the Colorado Valley 
and the high levels of Santa Rosa. The first pass is the 
shorter and more precipitous, receiving its name from 
an overhanging shelf of rock at one of the entrances 
which resembles a doorway. It is 13,780 feet at the 
highest, and is very dangerous in winter. The Uspal- 
lata is the main highway between the Argentine and 
Chili. Its extreme height is 12,780 feet above the sea; 
it lies near Aconcagua, the loftiest summit of the Cor- 
dillera from Panama to the Straits ; and it involves a 
journey of 225 miles from Mendoza to Santa Rosa, 
better known as Los Andes. Mr. Darwin, in his cele- 
brated excursion to the Cordilleras, entered the Argen- 
tine by the Portillo and returned to Chili by the 
Uspallata, his record of observations on the physical 
features of the country remaining after fifty years the 
only trustworthy work of reference on that section of 



1^8 TROMCAL AMERICA 

the mountains. The Andean system there, as further 
north in Peru, comprises three distinct chains, with an 
average breadth of 250 miles for the entire mountain 
belt. The easternmost Cordillera is known as the 
Paramillos. The central Cordillera is the highest con- 
tinuous section of the Andean wall, there being only- 
two gaps from Aconcagua to Maypu, a distance of 
nearly 100 miles, where the crests fall below 18,000 or 
19,000 feet. Two of the summits, Aconcagua and 
Tupungato, exceed 22,000 feet in height. 

The Uspallata was the gorge for which we were head- 
ing; but there were dull levels to be traversed before 
the gates of the Paramillos could be passed. For thirty 
miles after Mendoza, with its irrigated meadows, its 
long files of poplars, and its vineyards and farms had 
been left behind, the road led north through an arid 
region, on a line parallel with the mountains. The 
heat was intense ; a cloud of suffocating dust was raised 
by the mules' hoofs; and every mile of progress was 
laborious. There were neither posadas nor houses 
along this barren stretch, and breakfast at noon had to 
be supplied from the saddle-bags and gulped down 
under a blazing sun. The outlying spurs of the Para- 
millos seemed very near, but we were hours in passing 
them. It was two o'clock before we could turn west- 
ward from the arid plain and enter the defile leading to 
the Cordillera. Then began a toilsome ascent, gradual 
at the outset, but precipitous in the course of two 
hours. For fifteen miles from the entrance of the defile 
I kept my seat in the saddle, exhausted from the fatigue 
of a first day's tramp of forty-five miles, begun without 
coffee and continued on a cold breakfast. At last, 
toward five o'clock, my head began to swim, and I 



THE HEART OF THE ANDES 129 

found myself falling, faint and senseless, from the back 
of the mule. It was an attack of sorroche, or mountain 
sickness. 

This was a test of the loyalty of the Chilian guides, 
whom I had suspected early in the morning of harbor- 
ing sinister designs against an unprotected traveller. 
One of them plunged into the woods to get water from 
a spring, while the other whipped out the brandy flask 
and restored me to consciousness. Telling me that we 
were near a post-house, they led my mule and speedily 
helped me to dismount. It was one of the wretched 
hovels which are called mountain hotels, but I heard 
some sweet music in the doorway. Two travellers, 
who had arrived a few moments before from the direc- 
tion of Chili, were chatting together in English, one 
of them with an unmistakable American accent. I 
briefly explained the situation and they at once ob- 
tained a bed for me indoors and ordered coffee and soup. 
They advised me to remain there all night unless I 
felt strong enough to go nine miles further, where there 
was a better hotel. They resumed their journey when 
they had done what they could to make me comfortable, 
leaving me at leisure to contemplate the crowning 
achievement of posada cuisine. It was an anomalous 
chicken fricassee, served as a soup in a very large bowl, 
and lavishly garnished with potatoes, onions, rice, and 
herbs. The guide stood by watching me eagerly while 
I ate as much of it as I could. At first I fancied this 
was sympathetic solicitude for an exhausted traveller's 
health; but I was speedily undeceived. No sooner had 
I dropped the spoon than he seated himself before the 
bowl and with a patronizing air dined at my expense. 
I was too weary to resent his impudence, but retired to 



130 TROPICAL AMERICA 

the only guest-room of the posada, — a rough shed with 
a small window and a door which could neither be 
locked nor barred, — and slept the sleep of utter exhaus- 
tion. At dawn I was aroused by the guide, whose nine 
mules were already saddled and packed for the day's 
march. Warned by the previous day's experience, I 
insisted upon having coffee served before we started, 
and upon making arrangements for a breakfast at the 
next posada, which we reached at ten o'clock. Here 
an excellent soup, with meat, bread, and coffee, invigo- 
rated me for the hard riding of the day, — over forty 
miles of mountain climbing and valley cantering. 

From the defile of Villa Vicencio, entered the previ- 
ous afternoon, had begun the ascent of the Paramillos, 
and about one o'clock in the afternoon we were at the 
summit, 9000 feet above sea level and 6500 feet above 
Mendoza. The scenery had increased in grandeur every 
hour after daybreak, and now two magnificent specta- 
cles were to be enjoyed. The first was a broad view 
of the Cuyo Valley southward and eastward with Men- 
doza, its shaded streets, its plazas, and its suburban 
farms and vineyards directly below us, and so near, 
that, with a glass, streets and houses could be identi- 
fied. The second was an inspiring glimpse of the 
main Andean chain now suddenly towering thousands 
of feet above us in the west. Tupungato in solemn 
majesty looked down upon us from the clouds. Then, 
with a sharp turn in the bridle-path, a hundred snow- 
clads were revealed at once. It was a spectacle that 
fired my blood. There was no companion in sympa- 
thetic touch with my enthusiasm; but the Chilian 
guide at least had ears to hear compliments showered 
upon his native mountains. Leaping from the mule I 



THE HEART OF THE ANDES 131 

shouted, "Magnifico! Magnifico!" and then, from the 
sense of the inadequacy of the Spanish tongue for 
expressing genuine Yankee feeling, I added, "Hail 
Columbia! Glory, Hallelujah!" A flush of patriotic 
pride illumined the Chilian's face as he repeated, 
"Magnifico!" Then he produced a bottle of wine 
from the saddle-bags and we drank together to the 
health of the Andean Kings, with their snowy ermine 
falling from their stately shoulders. 

Nature had worked there on a stupendous scale. 
This mighty wall of continuous snow peaks rose 
abruptly from the valley at the base of the Paramillos 
15,000 feet to and beyond the snow line. As seen from 
the crests of the eastern range, the precipitous moun- 
tain flanks seemed to have been thrown up almost ver- 
tically, and to have been strewn with the wreckage of 
ancient glaciers. It was late in the summer and the 
snow-drifts in which the mountain sides were em- 
bedded a few months before had shrunk and wasted in 
feeding swollen lakes and roaring torrents; but those 
majestic summits with their sub-Arctic climate never 
could be bare. Where there were sharp peaks, with 
polished sides like the flanks of Aconcagua, the snow 
could slide down and find lodgement in cavernous 
ravines; but the snow-beds were always there. The 
crests of the Paramillos were swept by cold winds, and 
the ground and stunted bushes were covered with snow. 
There could be no halt in so desolate a spot, although 
the vista of the wall of snow-clads was incomparably 
glorious, and could not again be seen to equal advan- 
tage. The tinkle of the mule-leader's bell kept the 
cavalcade in motion without reference to scenic won- 
ders. From the crest we descended hour after hour to 



132 TROPICAL AMERICA 

the gorge of Uspallata, where at sunset the best hotel 
known in the mountains was reached. There all sense 
of loneliness was removed by the arrival of parties of 
travellers from Chili, and the day closed with a com- 
fortable dinner and good cheer. In the morning came 
a magnificent sight — sunrise in the Uspallata Valley. 
The Paramillos in the east flank the Andes north and 
south. The sunlight, slanting upward over the outer 
wall, touches the snow peaks of the Cordillera, and 
changes them from murky white to vivid scarlet, while 
the ravines and mountain flanks underneath remain 
obscured in shadow. Gradually the spaces below the 
snow-drifts catch the light, and are transformed from 
dusky gray to warm crimson fringed with olive verdure 
at the base. The shadow line is now at the bottom of 
the Andean wall. Slowly it recedes across the inter- 
vening valley, and shrinks and disappears on the west- 
ern side of the Paramillos. The Uspallata is a splendid 
blaze of color. The monarchs of the Andes, robed in 
scarlet and crimson, are crowned with majesty befitting 
their high estate. 

The third day's ride, for which I again took precau- 
tions to arm myself by a stout breakfast, was from Us- 
pallata to Punta de las Vacas, a distance of forty miles 
toward the heart of the Andes. The left bank of the 
Mendoza River was followed closely, the road leading 
over rock and gravel the greater part of the way. The 
mountains were a wall on the right hand and on the 
left. It was a long winding gorge, through which the 
spring freshets had cut their way, tunnelling through 
gigantic masses of rock and undermining the founda- 
tions of the mountains. The road was a bridle-path, 
curving around boulders, leaving its serpentine trail 



THE HEART OF THE ANDES 133 

now on the river bottom and again high on the moun- 
tain side, and ti^aversing inclines so precipitous that 
the traveller hardly dared to bend over in the saddle 
lest the mule should lose its footing in the slippery 
laderas. Water courses which had been glistening as 
silvery cascades in mountain chasms were forded as 
roaring torrents plunging to their death in the great 
gorge of the Mendoza. Two bridges were passed, one 
an arch of cement and timber over a dangerous stream, 
and the other a more substantial but less picturesque 
structure, which was built by one of the governors of 
Mendoza. The valley was constantly changing its 
direction, since its main lines had been caused by ero- 
sion. All the processes of recurring seasons and natu- 
ral transformations were revealed on mountain side and 
in river bottom. It was plain that this remarkable 
valley was not a structural formation produced in the 
original upheaval of the mountain masses. It had 
been hollowed out by the alternate rush of the spring 
torrents and the subsidence of swollen streams. High 
up where the stupendous mountain crowns were lost 
among fleecy clouds one could perceive where the snow- 
drifts began to trickle, where the converging streams 
were formed year after year, and where the torrents 
were emptied into the river. The water was at its 
lowest ebb; but the medium and high levels were to be 
traced as distinctly, mile after mile, as if they had been 
scientifically surveyed and marked off by a measuring- 
line. The river bed was almost empty ; but the lines of 
sudden expansion and gradual shrinkage were unerr- 
ingly revealed. The floods had clapped their hands 
season after season, and the chasm between the moun- 
tain slopes had been worn away in a sinuous course 



134 TROPICAL AMERICA 

and gradually deepened. The Uspallata had its tale 
of fire as well as of water graven on its bottom lands 
and towering cliffs. For every glacial moraine of 
stranded boulders there were areas of volcanic dis- 
turbance. 

The Uspallata is a valley of enchanting surprises 
and sublime spectacles ; but after ten hours in the saddle 
the most wonderful scenic panorama wearies the eyes 
and ceases to excite human interest. The wind, in- 
creasing to a gale in the defiles converging at Punta de 
las Vacas, chills and benumbs the exhausted traveller, 
who from sheer weariness is almost willing to exchange 
all his earthly possessions for dinner and bed. The 
attitude of suspicion with which at the outset I had 
regarded the mendacious guide had been modified by 
three days of good behavior on his part and security on 
my own ; but the grim thought occurred to me during 
the last hours of this fatiguing day's ride, that if he still 
entertained the malevolent design of murdering and 
plundering me in the mountains, it would be pleasant 
to be despatched at once, and to be spared the neces- 
sity of going another mile, when I had ceased to retain 
sufficient energy even to kick a mule with a spur. 
But the most wearisome journey comes to an end, and 
Punta de las Vacas, most picturesque of mountain inns 
in photographs, and the dirtiest and most dilapidated in 
reality, received the men and mules of our party at 
sunset. I dined on guanaco meat with a group of 
coarse but not unkindly mountaineers, and crawled 
into the main guest-room of the rookery as soon as the 
repast was finished. In the middle of the night I was 
suddenly awakened by a rustling noise, and instantly 
I felt a heavy touch upon the bed. Convinced that 



THE HEAUT OF THE ANDES 135 

the mountain marauders had crept into the room and 
were robbing me, I sprang from the bed and prepared 
to defend myself. No attack was made, but the rust- 
ling noise was repeated under the bed. A match and 
a candle between them revealed the intruders. Two 
large dogs were under the bed and another was on the 
blanket. The innkeeper, taking compassion upon my 
loneliness, must have opened the door early in the even- 
ing, and let in these great shaggy creatures to protect 
me during the night watches, and, incidentally, to 
frighten me out of my wits. 

For the fourth day's ride I had an early start. 
The guide benignantly shared his coffee with me and 
promised me a wholesome breakfast at the foot of the 
Cumbre, — a pledge subsequently fulfilled, although 
hard riding was required for overtaking the mule train. 
Glorious mountain scenery was before us; the rock- 
bound monastery of the Penitentes, with its procession 
of pilgrim boulders; the gigantic convolutions of the 
Tolorzia Valley; the abysses of the Cuevas; the deso- 
late Portillo lake; the Soldiers' Leap, with its zigzags 
of mule-trail; and the picturesque junction of the 
Blanco and Juncal. Punta de las Vacas was on a 
level with the crest of the Paramillos, whence on the 
second day we had gazed with awe and delight upon 
the glittering wall of Andean peaks. At the Incas 
bridge, a wonderful natural formation, where there 
were hot springs in a rocky chasm, the elevation above 
the sea was 10,570 feet, and a casucha, or hut, at the 
foot of the Cumbre, which we reached at noon, was not 
much higher. During the ride of twenty-five miles to 
this point we had gradually been approaching the di- 
viding line of the continental watershed. The valley 



136 TROPICAL AMERICA 

was a narrow gorge ; the Mendoza River at daylight a 
mountain torrent and at noon a foaming brook. We 
were at the base of the Cumbre, or central summit, 
which we were to cross in order to descend the Chilian 
slope. During the next two hours we ascended this 
barrier for over 2000 feet, the path leading by a series 
of precipitous zigzags from one slope to another. As 
we went higher the snow-clad peaks, Juncal and Tu- 
pungato, towered above us once more, as they did on 
the second day at the Paramillos, but nearer, more 
majestic, and more stupendous. After a few more 
miles of toilsome ascent and we were at the crest of 
the Cumbre, 12,795 feet above sea level. Those silver 
threads here and there were the beginning of rivers 
emptying into the Atlantic. Those tangled skeins 
near the snow beds yonder were the sources of the 
Aconcagua and rivers flowing into the Pacific. This 
great bowl, shaped like a crater, torn with deep rents 
and floored with volcanic rocks, among which the 
hardiest yellow and white flowers of the sub-Arctic 
zone were in bloom, was a continental dividing line., 
It was an earthquake-shattered region over which the 
creative mysteries of the past seemed to brood. The 
gales which swept over it came from the Atlantic, and 
depositing their last drops of moisture in snow, passed 
on to the rainless seaboard of the Pacific, dry, cool, and 
balmy. This was the heart of the Andes. It filled 
the mind with shuddering ideas of desolation and stu- 
pendous creative energy. 

Magnificent as was the scenery, with Juncal reveal- 
ing its ruined crater and Tupungato towering in solemn 
silence 10,000 feet overhead, we could not linger long 
in this desolate spot. There was a hut on the crest for 



THE HEART OF THE ANDES 137 

the protection of travellers beset with snow storms and 
hurricanes ; but there was no provision for the mules, 
and it was impossible to corral them on the wind- 
swept summit. The descent from the Cumbre was 
rapidly made. At Calaveras there was another hut, 
and further on another. Then came the descent of the 
Caracoles, one of the boldest and most picturesque sec- 
tions of the Uspallata circuit. The springs of the 
Aconcagua could be traced to snow-drifts melting on 
the mountain sides. It gave me a strange sensation to 
see rivers which were to be sources of life, systematic 
irrigation, and vegetable growth, actually created under 
my eyes in the ooze of the Andean snow beds, and grad- 
ually deepening into brooks and widening into torrents. 
At Tambillos we were at a level of about 11,000 feet. 
Thence we passed the Incas Lake, and, after a series of 
precipitous descents, reached a tranquil river course and 
a post-house. So precipitous were the slopes of the 
Cordillera on the Chilian side that by nightfall we were 
5000 feet below the summit and 7340 feet above the 
sea. 

The conduct of the guide had been so irreproachable 
for four days, and the road had been frequented by so 
many mule droves and groups of travellers, that all 
sense of danger and loneliness had been dispelled. Our 
team of nine mules had frequentl}^ been increased to 
twenty or thirty, and our group of two guides and one 
passenger to a company of a dozen men. The travel- 
lers were Chilian mountaineers, who fraternized with 
the guides, but their salutations to me were courteous, 
and their manners unobtrusive. It was at Ojos del 
Agua, during the fourth evening, when my confidence 
in the guide, whom I had convicted of shameless men- 



138 TROPICAL AMERICA 

dacity on the first day, had been completely restored, 
that he revealed his true character and justified my 
earliest apprehensions. He came to me with face 
flushed with drink, and demanded an increase in his 
hire. I deliberately refused to understand him, making 
good use of my unfamiliarity with Spanish. The next 
morning he returned to the assault and was met in the 
same way. We mounted for the fifth day's ride to the 
Colorado and Santa Rosa. The scenery was of en- 
chanting loveliness, the rivers foaming in rapids and 
falling in cascades the greater part of the way, and the 
mountain gorge gradually opening into a broad and 
beautiful valley. The guide was not disposed to allow 
me to enjoy this wonderful scenery in peace. Re- 
peatedly he joined me, and sought to convince me that 
I must pay him more money in order to be conducted 
all the way to Santa Rosa. He was reinforced by three 
Chilians, who surrounded me and made unmistakable 
gestures in the direction of my pocket; but I declined 
to comprehend their meaning. This comedy was 
enacted at two o'clock, when we reached Guardia, the 
frontier custom-house. The guide was royally drunk, 
his successive failures to make his passenger understand 
and comply with his exactions having driven him in 
despondent mood into every wayside drinking place. 

I was weary of this by-play. Concluding from the 
aspect of the country that we could not be far from 
Santa Rosa, and that it would not be difficult to obtain 
a coach, I called the guide to me, paid him the original 
contract price, and discharged him. He was dazed for 
a moment, and then quickly rallied, assuring me that I 
could not get a coach, and that as it would be impossi- 
ble to reach Santa Rosa that day, I must go on with 



THE HEART OF THE ANDES 139 

him. This I refused to do, and ordered him to unload 
my baggage mule. Instead of complying with this 
demand, he whipped up the mule and disappeared down 
the road. The glimpse of my baggage vanishing in 
the turn of the road made me disconsolate. I had no 
alternative. I had to follow my baggage or run the 
risk of losing it altogether. I mounted my mule, and 
went on with the train for an hour, apprehending that 
the drunken guide would lodge me for the night in 
some wretched posada, where I might be exposed to 
serious danger. In this emergency two Chilian gentle- 
men appeared opportunely upon the scene, driving in a 
coach with three horses to Santa Rosa. They had 
heard that an American traveller was having trouble 
with a drunken guide, and had come to the rescue. 
In five minutes my baggage was on the coach, and we 
were bowling merrily along the road toward Santa 
Rosa. At six o'clock we were dining in an excellent 
hotel in the plaza of the town, the long journey from 
Mendoza having ended. 

Los Andes was a restful and delightful spot to one 
who had been making intimate acquaintance with a 
refractory mule in the mountains. It had one of the 
old-fashioned Spanish hotels, with sleeping rooms, 
dining-room, and baths on the ground floor, and several 
open courts in the interior, planted with parterres of 
flowers and kept cool and spotlessly neat. How charm- 
ing was the retirement of those fragrant patios after 
the cattle-sheds of the mountains! How wholesome 
and refreshing were the dinners after those inscrutable 
mysteries, the chicken sopas of the post-houses ! How 
clean and alluring was the bed-linen after the dog-mats 
of Punta de las Vacas I In peace and comfort I could 



140 TROPICAL AMERICA 

revel there in thoughts of miseries escaped at Mendoza, 
of mercenary guides baffled in their attempted extor- 
tions, and of exhilarating experiences and sublime 
spectacles stored in the memory to remain a delight in 
coming years. The town was the usual Spanish chess- 
board, with the four central squares reserved for the 
plaza, the brass band, the church, and the hotels. 
There was little to be seen in the lanes crossing one 
another at right angles ; but how glorious was the vista 
of the Andes and the maritime range ! The drives and 
walks about this beautiful town were sources of unfail- 
ing delight. Aconcagua, with its triple peaks piercing 
the clouds, was seen once more, tranquil and restful in 
its shapely beauty, and no longer awe-inspiring in its 
stupendous power and sublime majesty. The ravines 
of the Colorado and the approaches to the Guardia, 
the starting-point for the journey eastward, were easily 
recognized. Mountains were encamped on every side 
about this Andean outpost, exchanging their shadow 
signals and countersigns during the watches of the night 
and marshalling their battalions for inspection at dawn. 
The passage of the Uspallata is made most easily 
during January and February, when the snow has dis- 
appeared from the lower mountain slopes and the river 
levels are lowest. From April to November snow 
storms are constantly met with, the bridle-paths are 
slippery, and the discomforts and perils of the journey 
are multiplied. Mountaineers and mail-couriers force 
the passage even in the most inclement weeks of 
winter, travelling on foot over the Cumbre. The 
scenery in the winter time, when the abysses are en- 
gulfed with *f now, and the rugged mountain walls are 
incased in ice, must be of unrivalled grandeur, but a 



THE HEABT OF THE ANDES 141 

prudent traveller will be content to make the journey 
in midsummer. Even when the road is dry there is 
constant danger, since a mule with characteristic per- 
versity persists in travelling along the outer edge of the 
slope on the edges of the precipices, and it is unsafe, 
as well as useless, to attempt to make him swerve from 
his self-regulated course. When the road is coated 
over with ice one must be a hardy mountaineer in 
order to rise superior to the perils of precipitous chasms 
and deeply sunken river bottoms. The sense of loneli- 
ness increases, moreover, when few travellers are on the 
highway, and one is confronted with the solemn still- 
ness and gloomy grandeur of the Andes. In midsum- 
mer the passing of mule trains imparts animation and 
variety to the journey. The picturesque ponchos, and 
the bright fantastic patterns of the neck-gear worn by 
the guides and mountaineers, add a welcome touch of 
color to the barren edges of bridle-paths. When fellow- 
travellers are met, it is a sudden refreshing contact of 
human companionship. Smiles and "buenos dias" are 
exchanged, and the file of the passing cavalcade is 
watched as it disappears in the zigzag of the road. 
Human society is the more welcome from the absence 
of animal life in the mountains. The guide-books 
represent condors as perched on the heights of the most 
dangerous passes where a traveller will be pitched head- 
long a thousand feet into abysses if the mule goes 
wrong. I did not see these grim sentinels. I heard 
the twitter of only one bird in the course of the five 
days' ride. That was a wee thing, only as large as a 
swallow.. 

Unfortunate as was my own choice of a guide, I can 
readily believe that most of the mountaineers are honest 



142 TROPICAL AMERICA 

and respectful in their dealings witli strangers. All 
danger of suffering from imposition and rapacity is 
removed when one is familiar with Spanish or has a 
travelling companion. The road is so direct that the 
services of a guide are unnecessary. The best way to 
cross the Andes is to send one's baggage on ahead with 
a mule train, and then to buy a mule and to proceed 
without guides, but with fellow-travellers. In this 
way halts can be made at the best posadas, and the 
journey lengthened from five to seven days, with less 
fatigue and greater enjoyment of the scenery. When 
the opposite mountain slope is reached the mule can be 
sold at a sacrifice which will not exceed the hire of a 
guide. A ride through the magnificent gorge of Uspal- 
lata and over the Cumbre to the heart of the Andes is 
an experience never to be forgotten. It offers glimpses 
of unrivalled mountain scenery. It brings one close to 
the secret laboratories of Nature, where earth-rending 
forces have been at work, with primal sources of power, 
creative or destructive, buried in appalling mystery. 



VIII 
CHILI AND ITS CIVIL WAR 

SIGNS OF PATRIOTISM AND THRIFT — A HOMOGENEOUS POP- 
ULATION SANTIAGO AND VALPARAISO DEVELOPMENT 

OF EUROPEAN TRADE THE CONSTITUTIONAL CONFLICT 

THE CIVIL WAR DOWNFALL OF BALMACEDA 

One of the earliest indications of the passage of the 
mountain frontier was the Chilian flag floating from a 
high staff where it could be seen miles away from the 
valleys below. As I continued the descent of the 
Andean slopes, I noticed the same flag many times above 
signal stations and surveyors' landmarks. The display 
of the national colors, at the earliest practicable points 
on the road from the Argentine, was characteristic of 
the patriotism of the Chilian people. Of all the nations 
in South America it has the deepest affection and the 
noblest enthusiasm for its flag. The Chilians may 
have their faults, but they have the redeeming virtue 
of intense love of country. They are proud not only of 
the material progress of the nation, but also of its mari- 
time supremacy, and of the achievements of the fighting 
services on land and sea. The victorious war with 
Peru is an heroic period, which ministers alike to an 
exalted loyalty and to an overweening vanity. Mon- 
uments to admirals and generals are seen in the plazas 
and alamedas of the cities. There is hardly a village 
where prints and photographs of the naval fight at 

143 



144 TROPICAL AMERICA 

Iquique cannot be found in the shop windows. The 
facility with which two powerful States were over- 
powered, and deprived of large territories, fostered an 
elastic confidence in the superiority of the nation as a 
Spanish- American fighting power, and a feeling of con- 
tempt for the military claims of rivals. Self-esteem 
was developed to a degree almost vainglorious. It 
was a pride doomed to be humiliated during the Civil 
War; but even in that disastrous struggle there was, 
withal, sterling patriotism of a true and honest ring. 

The population of Chili is more homogeneous than 
that of the Argentine. The number of foreigners of 
unmixed blood is very small in comparison with the 
native Chilian stock. The aboriginal strain runs in 
seven-tenths of the population. I noticed the contrast 
between Italianized Argentina and the maritime State 
in my first study of faces at Los Andes. There was a 
marked uniformity of facial types. Men and women 
alike had swarthy complexions, large, deep-set, bril- 
liant eyes, and hair at once black, bristling, and glossy. 
In Buenos Ayres one watches a cosmopolitan crowd 
recruited from every race in Europe, and wonders where 
the natives are and what they are like. In Chili he 
sees, in the main, a people of uniform type and marked 
characteristics. It is, undoubtedly, the best of the 
Spanish-American races. In volume the population is 
probably 1,000,000 less than that of the Argentine, a 
safe estimate being 3,000,000 against 4,000,000. 

From Los Andes I made the journey in an English 
compartment car to Santiago, catching from the win- 
dows glimpses of mountain scenery and green mead- 
ows, broad areas of successful cultivation, and tidy 
homesteads with capacious barns. In Central Chili 



CHILI AND ITS CIVIL WAR 145 

irrigation is essential to prosperous farming. Rains 
are confined mainly to three months of the twelve, and 
without artificial supplies of water from the mountain 
streams agricultural operations are impracticable. The 
areas of cultivation are the valleys where trenches can 
be multiplied, and between these verdant belts are arid 
wastes which in midsummer are burned bare. It is 
an unerring proof of the indomitable energy of the 
people that agriculture is carried on at all in Central 
Chili under conditions so unpropitious. 

Like Rio de Janeiro the Chilian capital needs to be 
an imposing city in order to be worthy of its scenic 
setting. It is in the centre of a lovely valley, encom- 
passed by shapely mountains of magnificent propor- 
tions. The same lofty peaks, which from the Cumbre 
overpower a sympathetic spectator with their gloomy 
grandeur, their ice-bound abysses, and their vistas of 
rock-riven desolation, from Santiago are restful sum- 
mits rising one upon another and irradiated with rich 
mists of sunlight. The barren edges flung against the 
sky, where shattered masses of rock hang in menacing 
instability, are transformed into peaceful crests, streaked 
with glittering snow. Chasms which close to the eye 
reveal the havoc wrought by earth-rending forces are 
delicately tinted lines of shadow in the distant vista of 
the Andes. With so grand and inspiring a pageant 
always to be seen from the Alameda and St. Lucia, 
Santiago has not neglected its opportunities. It is a 
handsome and impressive city, with fine parks, strik- 
ing architectural effects in its public buildings and 
churches, and orderly, well-kept lines of streets, many 
of which have superior Belgian pavements and electric 
lights. The only source of disfigurement is the river 



146 TROPICAL AMERICA 

Mapocho flowing through the town, which in the dry- 
season labors under the disadvantage of not having any 
water in it; but this is shielded from view by walls 
and embankments and rendered as sightly as possible. 
The population of Santiago ranges between 225, 000 and 
250,000. 

The Alameda is a broad avenue over two miles long, 
with double lines of trees, and a series of monuments 
and statues commemorative of the public services and 
heroic deeds of various patriots. Only one thing is 
needed in order to make it an impressive and beautiful 
street. That is a greensward in place of the unsightly 
promenade under the trees. Handsome turf is what 
one never sees in South America, and in Santiago there 
is not enough rain to keep a lawn fresh or grass from 
being burned and killed in midsummer. A trench of 
running water running along the central common is a 
practical demonstration of the facility of irrigation, and 
some day a municipal reformer may supply what is lack- 
ing in this ambitious avenue of monuments. St. Lucia 
was a neglected and barren rock in the heart of the 
city, and was occupied and frequented only by the 
lowest classes, when a public-spirited citizen, Vicuna 
Mac Kenna, undertook to convert it into the best 
pleasure ground of the capital. It is now approached 
by winding carriage roads, stone staircases, and shaded 
walks, and is ornamented with terraces, banks of flowers, 
artistic balustrades, rustic arbors, grottos, a chapel, a 
statue, and a series of high lookouts commanding mag- 
nificent prospects of the Andes, the maritime range, 
and the capital itself. There is a theatre on the 
highest ground in the city, and there is also an excel- 
lent restaurant where a dinner or an ice can be ordered. 



CHILI AND ITS CIVIL, i47 

The flowers and vines on this lofty rock overhanging 
the Alameda are kept fresh and beautiful by constant 
watering, and St. Lucia is the most picturesque and 
artistic feature of the capital. It is a miniature Cor- 
covado accessible from the main streets. 

The main plaza has the post-office, municipal build- 
ings, and arcades of stucco on two sides, the ambitious 
fagade of the Grand Hotel on another, and, finally, the 
Cathedral built of brick and stone, with a cross high in 
air to demonstrate a sacred character which its general 
architectural lines do not reveal, although the interior 
is chaste and rich. The capitol is a block away, a mas- 
sive structure, with two high stories and a flat roof, and 
lines of shapely columns at the entrance on each side. 
It is the handsomest and most imposing Hall of Dep- 
uties to be seen in South America, and is surrounded 
by well-kept, if narrow, grounds, with one graceful and 
finely proportioned statue near the main entrance. The 
National Library is close by, with the Palaces of Jus- 
tice adjoining. The University of Santiago is a stately 
structure, and it has well-equipped faculties and appli- 
ances for higher education. Probably no university in 
South America has a better academic reputation or is 
doing a larger work. The Astronomical Observatory 
has lovely surroundings in a well-shaded, semi-tropical 
garden. The Quinta Normal is a horticultural garden 
and museum of natural history, with fine grounds taste- 
fully laid out. Santiago abounds in good architecture 
of a classic type, and in public gardens and promenades 
of genuine natural attractions. With excellent hotels, 
good theatres, fine drives, and objects of interest which 
cannot be exhausted in a fortnight of industrious 
sight-seeing, it has everything to attract and charm a 



148 .tOPICAL AMERICA 

traveller. With the exception of Rio de Janeiro I have 
not found any South American city so interesting as 
Santiago. 

The plaza on Sunday morning was filled with black- 
gowned and hooded women on their way to church. In 
Chili, as in Peru, custom requires women to go to Mass 
dressed with severe simplicity. There are no seats in 
the churches, and nearly all worshippers take rugs or 
silk handkerchiefs on which to sit and kneel during 
service. Attracted by the novel sight of hundreds of 
women in black, I entered the church which was densely 
thronged. The black costumes massed in the nave and 
aisles intensified the effect of a lavish display of altar 
lights. An eloquent priest, with a fine face and an 
earnest, impressive manner preached, his melodious 
voice, with a solemn note of warning, filling the church 
like a trumpet. 

The Roman faith is found at its best in Chili, where 
a close approach has been made to a separation of 
Church and State, and where absolute religious toler- 
ance is practised. The clergy still receive stipends 
from the treasury; but the appropriations have been 
gradually reduced, and disestablishment cannot be de- 
ferred many years. Civil marriage alone is recognized 
by law as valid. In order to be legally married man 
and woman must appear before the register. When 
they leave his presence they are husband and wife. If 
they then choose to have a religious service in a Roman 
Catholic church, or in a Protestant chapel, they can do 
so. The enactment of the Civil Marriage Law was 
fiercelj^, but unsuccessfully, resisted by the clerical 
party. In like manner the Burials Act, opening cem- 
eteries to Protestants as well as Roman Catholics, was 



CHILI AND ITS CIVIL WAR 149 

passed in the face of determined opposition. Subse- 
quentl}' attempts were made in Santiago and elsewhere 
to remove bodies from what was considered desecrated 
ground, and to bury them in churches, but the authori- 
ties promptly suppressed this practice. Protestantism 
is protected by law and has a clear field. Presbyterian 
churches have been established in Valparaiso, Santiago, 
and Concepci6n, the late Rev. Dr. Trumbull having 
been a pioneer in the work. The American Metho- 
dists, entering the field at a more recent date, have 
done an important work, opening chapels and schools 
in Iquique, Copiap6, and Concepcion, and a college in 
Santiago. 

There are European bazaars in the streets of the 
Chilian capital where once there were Yankee notion 
stores. Between 1863 and 1888 the combined imports 
received in Chili from England, France, and Germany 
increased from $13,164,442 to $46,679,231. During 
the same period the imports from the United States 
advanced from $1,635,598 to $3,133,173. In view of 
the extraordinary efforts made by maritime Europe to 
develop trade with Chili, and of the utter indifference 
of the United States to the decadence of its commercial 
marine, upon which the growth and prosperity of the 
export trade depend, I marvel that there is a remnant 
so large. The Chilians are the most active commercial 
nation in South America, and are shaping the indus- 
trial fortunes of the West Coast. Maritime Europe 
appreciates the importance of cultivating the closest 
possible relations with them. The United States has 
not manifested interest in the wonderful development 
of Chilian industries and political power. 

Before the raids of English-Confederate cruisers on 



150 TROPICAL AMERICA 

the Yankee merchant fleet, the West Coast was largely 
supplied with American cottons, hardware, and general 
merchandise. The transfer of that fleet to the English 
flag during the Civil War was followed by a rapid 
decline of American trade and influence. There was 
one far-sighted merchant, — Chili has recognized its 
obligations for his public services by erecting a statue 
to him in one of its plazas, — who discerned the possi- 
bility of restoring trade by the establishment of a steam- 
ship line under the flag. Mr. Wheelwright laid his 
plan before New York capitalists, and demonstrated the 
practicability of controlling the commerce of the West 
Coast by a timely stroke of enterprise ; but this project 
was considered visionary, and he was compelled to seek 
for encouragement in England. The Pacific Naviga- 
tion Company was founded largely through his efforts ; 
and, to-day, it largely dominates the traffic of the sea- 
board from the Straits to Panama. A commanding 
opportunity for the extension of American trade was 
lost through neglect to supply steam communication. 
If a line had been established between 1865 and 1870 
from New York to San Francisco, with Pernam- 
buco, Bahia, Rio de Janeiro, Santos, Montevideo, 
Buenos Ayres, and the West Coast ports as far as 
Panama as the chief calling stations, there would have 
been, at least, a division of commercial empire in the 
south between the United States and maritime Europe. 
The development of steam communication has been 
rapid since the first steamers went out from Liverpool 
aided by an English subsidy. The Pacific Company 
sends out two steamers a month to Valparaiso, and has 
a powerful fleet on the West Coast, plying between all 
ports from Corral to Panama. It has as many as sixty 



CHILI AND ITS CIVIL WAK 151 

steamers in constant service, including tenders for col- 
lecting freight at the smallest ports. A second English 
company, known as the Gulf Line, has been established 
within a few years. The German Kosmos Line has a 
large fleet running between Hamburg, Montevideo, and 
Valparaiso, dispatching two steamers a month. It also 
has a number of steamers making regular trips between 
Valparaiso and the nitrate ports, as well as to Callao 
and Panama. There is a French line between Havre, 
Bordeaux, and Valparaiso, and there are several minor 
coasting lines under various flags. The most formida- 
ble competitor which the English Pacific line has in the 
coasting trade is the South American Steamship Com- 
pany under the Chilian flag. The Company has a pow- 
erful fleet, built expressly for the West Coast trade, and 
sends steamers twice a month from Valparaiso to Pan- 
ama, besides having fortnightly lines running to Lota 
and Chiloe, in the south, and to the nitrate ports and 
Callao in the north. 

The bulk of Chilian trade is with those countries 
which have established regular lines of steamship com- 
munication with Valparaiso. England has increased 
its exports to Chili from 14,090,069 in 1863 to |26,351,- 
141 in 1888, and its imports in return during the same 
period from 112,313,009 to 158,898,407. Germany 
beginning in 1863 with exports to Chili valued at 
$772,515, has increased them to $14,046,577 in 1888, 
while its imports in return have run up from $684,496 
to $4,751,990. These results have been secured by the 
two nations which have had the best steamship facili- 
ties for the movement of freight in the Pacific and Kos- 
mos lines. The French exports to Chili during the same 
period have expanded from $4,301,858 to $6,181,513, 



152 TEOPICAL AMERICA 

and the imports from $1,649,364 to $4,295,055. 
While there has been an increase, it is small in com- 
parison with the material progress made by Great 
Britain and Germany; and, as a coincidence, it is to 
be noted that the French steamship line is a feeble one, 
and is not equipped for serious competition with Ger- 
many and England. One of the best evidences of the 
utility of steamship communications in promoting com- 
mercial exchanges, is furnished by the rapid develop- 
ment of the Chilian import and export trade with Peru 
and Ecuador, which has followed the sharp competition 
for freights between the English and National lines on 
the West Coast. The bulk of the wheat surplus which 
is shipped from Talcahuano now goes north to feed a 
rainless seaboard of 2000 miles, and in exchange are 
received from Peru cotton, sugar, wool, and many other 
products. 

With a declining import and export trade in a period 
of unwonted commercial activity on the West Coast, 
American merchants in Valparaiso are compelled to 
admit that they cannot hope to compete successfully 
with English and German rivals under the present con- 
ditions of slow communication, high freights, breakage 
of goods at Panama, and lack of exchange on New 
York. Investments of European capital in Chili, 
moreover, have been very large. At least one-half of 
the national debt is held in England. To this must be 
added the capital invested in railways, copper and silver 
mines, nitrate works, steamship lines, and commercial 
business. Probably the aggregate English capital 
invested in Chili exceeds $125,000,000. Germany also 
has large invested interests; but Americans are repre- 
sented only by three commercial houses and two life 
insurance companies. 



CHILI AND ITS CIVIL WAR 153 

To one who has crossed the continent from the 
Atlantic, it is the background that makes Valparaiso 
alike interesting and impressive. That background 
is the Pacific, which from the windows of the English 
compartment cars suddenly comes into view in a far- 
reaching vista of tranquil blue fringed with yellow 
haze. In the translucent atmosphere of Chili the pow- 
ers of vision seem to be almost doubled. From the 
hillsides of Valparaiso one can see the Andean peak of 
Aconcagua, and when he gazes seaward the horizon 
line seems to be lifted back and projected leagues 
beyond its normal limits. One can never look upon an 
ocean for the first time without experiencing a thrill of 
pleasurable excitement, and that feeling is intensified 
when he has crossed a foreign continent and been among 
the snows of the Andes. With contrasting emotions 
the old-time Spanish navigators approached Valparaiso 
from the sea after tempestuous voyages in the Straits 
and perils averted off Chiloe. The first landmark on 
that barren, rainless coast was joyfully hailed by them 
as the Point of Angels, and the bold bluffs encircling a 
sheltered bay seemed to them a veritable Vale of Para- 
dise. One could have a more intelligent appreciation 
of their nomenclature, if he were convinced that they 
had come down the Western Sahara, stretching 2000 
miles southward from the Gulf of Guayaquil. After 
Atacama and the desolate coasts of Peru and Northern 
Chili, any verdant hillside would have been a glimpse 
of Eden. 

Valparaiso is a bustling city with a population of 
120,000. It was originall}^ built on the steep hillsides 
overlooking the harbor; but the modern town follows 
the winding shore, the narrow margin having been 



154 TROPICAL AMERICA 

widened and greatly extended by additional ground 
reclaimed from the sea. A town with curving streets 
and irregular outlines offers a refreshing contrast to 
the checker-board squares of the newer Spanish-Ameri- 
can cities. Valparaiso is without definite plan or out- 
line. There is a series of wide ravines opening from 
the crests of the hills, and each has its network of 
rambling streets and alleys, and its congeries of low- 
pitched roofs and weather-beaten houses. From the 
plaza opposite the custom-house landing and the 
railway station three or four business streets pursue 
their devious courses to the right and to the left 
along the curves of the bay. The modern town 
is adorned with monuments and statues wherever a 
plaza or a cluster of trees offers an opportunity for 
patriotic memorials. The most tasteful, as well as 
elaborate monument, is that erected in the central plaza 
in honor of Arturo Prat, commander of the Esmeralda, 
and the other heroes of the sea-fight at Iquique. The 
government buildings and churches are not impressive ; 
but there are showy blocks of shops, and there is a brisk 
movement of traffic in the streets. The chief attrac- 
tion of Valparaiso is the climate, which is tempered by 
ocean and aerial currents from the Antarctic. Even in 
midsummer, the mean temperature is sixty-three de- 
grees Fahrenheit for the month of January, with a 
maximum of seventy-seven degrees ; and in midwinter 
the minimum temperature is forty-five degrees with 
fifty-two degrees as the average for July. While the 
winters are about as warm as those of corresponding 
latitudes on the Atlantic coast, the summer heats are 
from eight to ten degrees lower. In Santiago the 
maximum temperature in summer is ten degrees higher 



CHILI AND ITS CIVIL WAR 155 

than that of Valparaiso ; yet the winters are much more 
severe in the mountain valley than on the coast, the 
difference in minimum temperature being fifteen de- 
grees. The climate of Valparaiso is singularly dry, 
equable, and invigorating. 

What is most surprising is the freshness of vegeta- 
tion in a town where rain is practically confined to 
three months and averages thirteen and a half inches 
for the year. Even in the middle of the long dry season 
the trees in the parks do not have a parched appearance ; 
and in Vina del Mar, a delightful suburb on the outer 
edge of the bay, where the wealthy residents of Santi- 
ago and other Chilian towns swarm during the heated 
period, there are remarkably brilliant displays of flow- 
ers, shrubs, and trees, the country looking fresh and 
verdant, as though there had been showers every week. 
It is a beautiful rolling country, with orchards and 
vineyards and fields of wheat waving in the ocean 
breeze. In the best of the suburban hotels in this beau- 
tiful spot Colonel Romeyn, the American Consul, enter- 
tained me at luncheon, and then took me for a delightful 
stroll in the groves and hillside paths ; and so orderly 
were the grounds, and so clean and comfortable was the 
hotel, that I found it hard to believe that I was not in 
one of the well-kept houses in the American Catskills. 
The illusion was strengthened when the Consul piloted 
me to his bower, a retired corner of the piazza curtained 
with a large American flag, and Mrs. Romeyn recalled 
her own circle of acquaintances in New York, and in 
sympathetic voice sang "Home, Sweet Home," to the 
accompaniment of a guitar. Such incidents are the 
treasure-trove of travel in a far country. How remote 
from our thoughts during that lovely afternoon was 



156 TROPICAL AMERICA 

apprehension of the civil war which within a year was 
to bring ruin and devastation upon Chili and hostile 
armies into that beautiful suburb of Vina del Mar! 

During the spring of 1890, when I was in Santiago 
and Valparaiso, the constitutional conflict which was 
to end in civil war, with the opening of another year, 
was already in progress. President Balmaceda, after 
representing most faithfully the progressive tendencies 
of the new Chili which had made itself a great power 
on the West Coast, had followed the vicious precedents 
of his predecessors, and in attempting to perpetuate his 
political supremacy by securing the election of an un- 
worthy successor had undermined public confidence in 
his patriotism. When elected to the presidency in 
September, 1886, he was known as a brilliant orator 
and an adroit tactician, and was not without experience 
in public life. He had been deputy for many years and 
subsequently senator and chief minister. As an official 
candidate favored by his predecessor, he had been op- 
posed by the advanced wing of the Liberal party ; but 
after his inauguration he had displayed consummate 
tact in conciliating factions, and, with a united body of 
congressional adherents behind him, had succeeded in 
enacting several reform measures, and in promoting the 
commercial prosperity of the country. During the first 
half of his term progress was made in the direction of 
the resumption of specie payments, railways were con- 
structed, harbors were improved, new mining regions 
were opened, hospitals and public buildings erected, 
the schools enlarged and multiplied, and the encroach- 
ments of Clericalism successfully resisted. It was an 
era of progress during which the creative energies of the 
most enlightened race in Spanish America were power- 



CHILI AND ITS CIVIL WAR 157 

fully stimulated. It was brought to a close when a 
statesman of genuine liberal tendencies, endowed with 
intellectual force, social graces, and remarkable politi- 
cal capacity, was tempted by sheer lust of power to 
organize a Ministry of Combat against Congressional 
prerogative, to debauch the army and the civil service, 
and to plunge the nation into a disastrous civil war. 

Chili was invaded during the sixteenth century by 
the Spanish conquerors of Peru ; but the Indian moun- 
taineers were never really conquered. After a hundred 
years of fierce campaigning the independence of the 
native tribes was acknowledged by treaty, and when its 
provisions were violated there was another half century 
of Indian warfare. The Chilians have a fighting strain 
in their native stock, and a love of liberty that is char- 
acteristic of a race of mountaineers. In the revolt 
against Spain the independence not of Chili alone, but 
of Buenos Ayres and Peru as well, was secured by the 
victories on the plains of Maypu. Under the Republic 
there were few conspiracies, and there was only one year 
of civil war until the uprising against Balmaceda oc- 
curred; but while there was peace there was a close 
approach to oligarchical rule. For sixty years the 
administration was controlled by a small number of 
wealthy landowners and a large body of priests recruited 
mainly from Italy and Spain. The President under 
the Constitution of 1833 was elected for five years by 
indirect suffrage, and while technically ineligible for a 
second term was either enabled to remain in office or 
to nominate his successor. There were five Cabinet 
Ministers in charge of the main departments of the 
Administration, with an English tradition of responsi- 
bility to the majority in the Chambers. Practically 



158 TEOPICAL AMERICA 

the two Houses were recruited from the aristocratic 
landowners and the President was supreme. Suffrage 
was restricted to 40,000 voters, and the government was 
directed by the rich land-barons. The power of such 
Presidents as Montt, Pinto, and Errazuriz was despotic ; 
but they were sagacious rulers who made no attempt 
to antagonize the ruling class and the priests. There 
was peace, but there was no government in Spanish 
America less democratic than that to which the high- 
spirited Chilians submitted without resistance. The 
Chilian is the best soldier in South America, not only 
because he has high courage bordering upon reckless- 
ness, but also because he has been taught to follow 
orders with unquestioning obedience. As a citizen he 
has ordinarily been loyal and submissive. 

The victories over the Peruvians not only inflated 
national pride but also developed the political instincts 
of the people. After the conquest of the nitrate prov- 
inces there was a popular movement in favor of emanci- 
pation from aristocratic rule and clerical domination. 
The Liberal party with Balmaceda as its leader 
triumphed in the elections of 1886. It was markedly 
hostile to the influence of the clergy in political affairs ; 
it favored free education by the State, and the mainte- 
nance of civil marriage and secularized cemeteries ; and 
it was committed to the policy of land reform. The 
Conservatives and Montt-Varistas represented the old 
order of clerical and aristocratic privilege, and were 
overwhelmed with defeat. Balmaceda having united 
his followers in Congress conducted the Administration 
most brilliantly for three years, and did much to popu- 
larize the Government by admitting to the civil service 
ambitious lawj^ers and politicians, who had never before 



CHILI AND ITS ClVIL WAR 159 

been in office. All went well until the close of 1889, 
when the official candidature of the Minister of Indus- 
try and Public Works startled the country and divided 
the Liberal party. If Balmaceda's favorite, San Fu- 
entes, had been either an experienced or a reputable 
official, less resistance would have been encountered; 
but he was conspicuous mainly for his stock operations 
on change. When he unfolded as an electoral pro- 
gramme a vast scheme of public works and railway con- 
struction, and Balmaceda made no concealment of an 
intention of favoring his canvass for the presidency 
with all the resources of official patronage, the Liberal 
majority sought to avert the crisis by communicating 
to the President privately their determination to oppose 
so unworthy a candidate. Temporary concessions were 
made to the majority, the Ministry was reorganized and 
Congress adjourned after expressing confidence in the 
Government by voting the customary financial supplies. 
In January, 1890, this Ministry was dismissed and 
another recruited from most zealous adherents was 
brought into office. Balmaceda instead of abandoning 
the candidature of his partisan had determined to defy 
Congress and the leaders of his party, and to carry the 
election by official pressure. 

This was the political situation as it was explained 
to me in Santiago ; and while there was intense excite- 
ment among the politicians, there was a general agree- 
ment even among the keenest observers that Balmaceda 
would finally yield to the will of Congress. The 
inflexible determination of that misguided, obstinate, 
but brilliant man, to rule or ruin the country was not 
then suspected. The Ministry remained in office until 
May and was then replaced by another still more auda- 



160 TROPICAL AMERICA 

cious, which met Congress with a defiant declaration 
that it was not dependent upon votes of confidence, 
but only upon the President's favor. Congress replied 
by a vote of censure passed by three-fourths of the 
members. The Ministers did not resign, although the 
financial credits were exhausted, and a new budget 
required authorization. Congress suspended in July 
the collection of revenues until a Ministry commanding 
its confidence should be formed. For a month no taxes 
were paid and Balmaceda refused to yield. Then he 
relaxed his opposition, appointed a Ministry composed 
of influential men, and announced that official influence 
would not be exerted in the electoral canvass. Con- 
gress met him in a conciliatory spirit, and voted finan- 
cial supplies for six months. 

As soon as the budget had been authorized the elec- 
toral canvass of San Fuentes was resumed, and local 
appointments were made in his interest. The Ministry, 
after vainly expostulating with the President, resigned 
office in October. The Ministry of Combat was restored. 
Menaced as it was with impeachment proceedings, it 
appealed to Balmaceda to anticipate hostile action by 
the exercise of his constitutional power of declaring 
the session of Congress closed. This was done as 
easily as Balmaceda could bar and lock the doors of his 
house. A Committee empowered by law to meet during 
recess of Congress flooded the Executive Mansion with 
protests, recommendations, and menaces; but he had 
gone too far to retreat. With the end of the year 
authority for the collection of revenues and taxes and 
the maintenance of the army and navy ceased. On 
January 1, 1891, the budget was decreed by Executive 
authority, the army was promised a large increase of 



CHILI AND ITS CIVIL WAR 161 

pay, public meetings were dispersed by the police and 
a military dictatorship was virtually proclaimed. The 
members of Congress, not being allowed to assemble, 
united in a memorial declaring the presidential office to 
be vacant. The navy revolted against the government, 
and, after failing to excite a popular uprising in Val- 
paraiso, carried the Congressional leaders to Iquique for 
the conquest of the nitrate coast as a base of military 
operations against Balmaceda. 

If the army had joined the navy the revolution would 
have triumphed without bloodshed. Popular move- 
ments had been planned both in Santiago and Valpa- 
raiso, but for some reason they hung fire. President 
Balmaceda at once declared the country under martial 
law ; but there was no popular reaction against his dic- 
tatorship. Valparaiso, while proud of the navy, was 
dazed and unsympathetic when the fleet turned against 
the government. The police did not swerve from their 
loyalty to the Executive. The army, instead of rallying 
to the support of the Congressional leaders, remained in 
the barracks and criticised the lack of common sense 
and patriotism displayed by the politicians. Santiago 
was heavily garrisoned and brought under police com- 
pression. There were few signs of disaffection in the 
southern cities. There was no popular uprising against 
the military dictator. The masses of the population 
waited to see what would come of the naval revolt, and, 
meanwhile, the President and his Ministers acted with 
inflexible purpose. Martial law was proclaimed. The 
officers of the insurgent fleet were denounced as pirates. 
The army was heavily recruited. The prisons were 
filled with suspects. Private houses were searched for 
incriminating correspondence. Men were flogged for 



162 TROPICAL AMERICA 

refusing to reveal the hiding-places of prominent revo- 
lutionists. The estates of members of the Opposition in 
Congress were plundered and their houses burned. 
Political leaders were proscribed and driven into exile. 
The election laws were modified to suit the purposes of 
the Ministers. Business was paralyzed. Disorder in 
the currency and national finances became confusion 
worse confounded. There was a rise in the price of 
food, and a ruinous increase in the cost of living. 
Public order in the cities was maintained by rigorous 
measures of repression, and terrorism was the order of 
the day. At the same time preparations were made for 
general elections, a new Congress was brought into 
existence, and Don Claudio Vicuna, a wealthy land- 
owner of high repute, was accepted as the candidate 
who was to succeed Balmaceda as President. 

The revolutionists had at the outset a fleet without 
an army. Within nine weeks a base of operations was 
secured in the nitrate provinces Avhere they could hold 
out for an indefinite period, and recruit and arm a force 
for the conquest of Valparaiso. With their fleet in 
command of the sea, and with hundreds of miles of 
desert between them and Santiago, they were protected 
against attack by Balmaceda's superior force. With 
the nitrate shipments under their control, they had a 
large source of revenue available for military purposes. 
Five months of desultory naval warfare and military 
preparations followed. Balmaceda had seized the 
Imperial, the best steamer of the Chilian line, and 
organized a small flotilla of torpedo-boats. These ves- 
sels attempted to harass the Congressionalists and were 
successful in sinking the ironclad, Blanco Encalada. 
Seven torpedoes were launched at her on a dark night, 



CHILI AND ITS CIVIL WAR 163 

when she was at anchor in port, and the assailants 
escaped after destroying the most formidable vessel of 
the fleet. The Congressionalists gradually recruited an 
army of 10,000 men, and remained on the defensive 
until they could properly arm it. The surrender of the 
Itata at Iquique to the American fleet after her arrival 
with a cargo of arms and ammunition from San Diego 
delayed offensive operations for several weeks. Envoys 
had been sent to the United States and to Europe to 
solicit recognition of belligerent rights ; but these over- 
tures failed except with the Bolivian Government, with 
which a convention was negotiated. Meanwhile Bal- 
maceda had succeeded in securing the vessels of war 
building in Europe. 

There was no time to lose, if full advantage of their 
naval supremacy was to be taken. When the Maypu 
arrived at Iquique, with ample supplies of rifles and 
ammunition, offensive operations were decided upon. 
The landing at Quinteros Bay was followed by a battle 
at Colmo, and after a brief interval by the decisive 
engagement at Placilla on August 28. The fighting 
began at seven in the morning, and before eleven the 
Balmacedists were routed. Two of their generals, 
Alzerreca and Barbosa, with 1000 men, were killed, 
3000 men were prisoners, and the remnant of the force 
of 10,000 men was scuttling from the battle field. The 
issue was never doubtful after the first gun was fired, 
and a complete victory was won, with the loss of 400 
men. By one o'clock Valparaiso was entered by the 
advance guard, and by nightfall the victorious army 
was encamped in the city with every indication of 
public rejoicing. Balmaceda's suicide at the Argen- 
tine Embassy in Santiago brought his inglorious career 



164 TEOPICAL AMERICA 

to a close. With the election of Admiral Montt to the 
Presidency Chili entered upon a new period of consti- 
tutional progress. 

There is hardly a Spanish-American country which 
has not had at one time or another its Balmaceda. 
Military dictatorships have been frequent in Uruguay, 
the Argentine, Paraguay, Bolivia, Peru, Colombia, 
Venezuela, Central America, and Mexico. Ordinarily 
the executive who defied the legislators and secured by 
the use of the army either the election of a favorite, or 
his own continuance in office, has been successful and 
usurpations have been tolerated. The moral of Balma- 
ceda's end is that public opinion in Chili has become 
so enlightened that military cabals and personal govern- 
ment are now impracticable. The financial results of 
the war were most deplorable. When the struggle 
opened there was a surplus of $30,000,000 in the treas- 
ury, preparations were making for specie resumption, 
and the national debt was not heavier than so pros- 
perous a country could carry without inconvenience. 
Balmaceda began by bringing $10,000,000 in paper into 
circulation, and by draining the silver reserve, and he 
ended by setting the printing-presses in operation and 
emitting issue after issue of depreciated money. The 
triumph of representative government over military 
usurpation has been purchased at high cost since the 
finances were left in great disorder and all industries 
were paralyzed. The Chilians are a hardy and ener- 
getic race, and they will not be overcome by difficulties 
and hardships. With peace will come political reform, 
constitutional revision, industrial development, and 
commercial enterprise. Their future is secure, for 
they are the most vigorous and patriotic race in South 
America. 



IX 

THE RAINLESS COAST 

A STUPENDOUS NATURAL PHENOMENON — THE CHILIAN SEA- 
BOARD ANTOFAGASTA AND IQUIQUE — NITRATE BEDS 

THE FLAG AT ARICA — THE PERUVIAN COAST — REPUDI- 
ATION OF PAPER MONEY DOWN THE ANDES IN A 

HAND -CAR — MR. MEIGGS'S ENGINEERING FEATS AN 

IRRATIONAL NATIONAL POLICY A MASTER-STROKE OF 

FINANCE AND DIPLOMACY 

In sailing northward from Valparaiso along the Chil- 
ian coast, the traveller is confronted with a stupendous 
natural phenomenon. He enters a rainless zone with- 
out vegetation or resources for sustaining human life. 
At Coquimbo, the first anchorage in the voyage from 
Valparaiso, he is well within the southern edge of this 
arid district. Thence for over 2000 miles he is to 
follow a mountainous coast where rain is virtually- 
unknown. This zone extends inland to the slope of 
the Andes, and varies in width from twenty to eighty 
miles. It includes one-third of the Chilian seaboard 
and the entire coast of Peru to the Gulf of Guayaquil. 
There the seaboard Sahara ends abruptly with the 
sharpest possible transition from bleak mountain head- 
lands to a coast clad with verdure and nourished by a 
vapor-laden atmosphere. 

The causes of these astonishing phenomena are 
explained by scientific writers. It is evident that the 

165 



166 TROPICAL AMERICA 

chief agent in producing this belt of desert seaboard 
is the Andes. The trade winds strike Northern Brazil 
loaded with vapor, and currents of air continuing in 
an oblique westward drift across the continent, supply 
the Plate and the Amazon river systems with abundant 
rainfall. When these currents beat against the ram- 
parts of the Andes, the remaining moisture is wrung 
from them by the condensing power of low tempera- 
tures at extreme altitudes. From the crest of the 
range there are no sources of evaporation until the 
tranquil levels of the Pacific are reached. The air 
currents in their passage to the coast are without 
moisture. The snows on the eastern slopes and central 
summits of the Andes are final deposits of vapor which 
exhaust the water supply of the Atlantic trades. There 
is nothing in reserve for the strip of seaboard and the 
intervening mountain slopes. Cooperating with this 
primal cause is the prevailing wind on the Pacific. 
From Tierra del Fuego a branch of the Antarctic cur- 
rent follows the northern trend of the West Coast, and 
winds accompany it to the equator, absorbing moisture 
all the way, but not swerving eastward after passing 
the Southern Chilian coast. These aerial currents in 
the latitudes of Northern Chili and Peru have gained 
by heat additional power of absorption, but carry their 
ample supplies of vapor northward, without being 
diverted to the coast, with its mountain buttresses. 
The air coming from the Andean summits has been 
squeezed dry by those mighty condensers. Rain storms 
from the west never blow inland. The rainless zone is 
thus deprived of all means of water supply, except the 
few meagre streams tumbling down the western slopes 
from the upland snow-drifts. 



THE KAINLESS COAST 167 

The traveller embarking as I did on a steamer at 
Valparaiso for Iquique at once discovers that he is 
bound for intermediate ports, which derive all their 
food supplies from Central and Southern Chili. There 
are droves of cattle on the lower deck to provide fresh 
meat for the towns of the rainless zone. The afterpart 
of the vessel is largely occupied by venders of vegeta- 
bles, fruits, butter, eggs, chickens, ducks, and hams. 
They are allowed to display their wares in small stalls 
and big baskets, and when the steamer arrives in port, 
market-dealers swarm out in small boats to obtain sup- 
plies from these pedlers. Every steamer of the English 
and Chilian lines is converted into a floating market 
all the way from Valparaiso to Iquique, where the 
stalls are removed and the hucksters dispose of the 
remnants of their stock on shore. The seaboard has 
to be fed week by week, almost day by day, from the 
South. 

The Chilian seaboard extends from the Peruvian 
frontier beyond Arica to Cape Horn, a distance of over 
2500 miles, and comprising forty degrees of latitude, 
and an area of nearly 300,000 English square miles. 
The northern belt, stretching from the seventeenth to 
the twenty-ninth parallels, is without rain. It contains 
nitrate deposits and silver and copper mines, and has 
inexhaustible mineral wealth. From the twenty-ninth 
to the thirty-third parallels is an intermediate zone with 
fertile valleys and mineral resources. Valparaiso and 
Santiago are on the southern boundary of this semi- 
agricultural zone. South of the thirty-third parallel 
stretches the main agricultural belt, with a copious rain- 
fall. This is Chili, the home of an essentially maritime 
nation, accustomed to struggle against nature and to 



168 TROPICAL AMERICA 

overcome every physical obstacle to its progress. In 
the far south its fishermen combat storm and glacier. 
On the Andean slopes its mountaineers are the hardiest 
of farmers. In the northern deserts its mining camps 
are pitched among the bleak mountain buttresses lining 
the coasts. The Chilians are a robust race, equipped 
for occupying unnatural homes, and trading in the 
exposed roadsteads scattered among the barren cliffs of 
their northern coasts. 

A remarkable feature of the coast scenery is its uni- 
formity. There is a continuous terrace of flat-topped cliffs, 
generally a thousand and sometimes two thousand feet 
high, retreating abruptly from the sea and leaving in front 
of the anchorages narrow shelves of beach, where the 
towns are built. This coast wall has a uniform direction 
north and south, and presents an aspect of singular 
regularity. Back of it are sometimes seen the slopes 
of the maritime range ; but ordinarily it limits the view 
with its reddish-gray, weather-beaten fa9ade. Devoid 
of vegetation and wooded slopes, it is wearisome and 
monotonous. There is a brief hour in the day when 
the dull red fades into gray and then deepens into blue 
under the slanting rays of the setting sun vrith. its pale 
lemon fires ; and then the coast scenery is beautiful. 
That is the transfiguring effect of the wonderful sunsets 
of the South Pacific, — sunsets as delicate in their gold 
and silver tinting as those of the South Atlantic are 
gorgeous with flaming scarlet and royal purple- 
As for the desolate towns on the coast, it is beyond 
the pencilling of that supi-eme artist, the sun, at morn- 
ing, noon, or dusk, to impart beauty or picturesqueness 
to them. There are rows of lumber sheds painted brown 
or yellow or blue, a sandy plaza with an ugly little 



THE EAENLESS COAST 169 

churcTi of iron or wood, and clusters of bar-rooms in the 
main street. Sometimes there are a few tall chimneys 
added, and whenever the port is of any size, there is a 
platform in the plaza for a brass band. Coquimbo is 
one of these coast-towns and Caldera is another, the 
port of Copiap6, a city with a population of 20,000, 
whose prosperity is declining, or at least stationary, 
through the failure of some of its oldest mines. At 
Caldera water is obtained from the river Copiap6, 
several miles away, and there are a few stunted bushes 
and flowering plants to be seen. Chanaral is another 
forlorn place with mining connections. Taltal, at the 
foot of sloping granite and sienite hills, is the receiving- 
point for supplies for several mining towns to which a 
railway leads. Dread of earthquakes and tidal waves 
stifles all civic ambition or private enterprise. Cheap 
frame houses and shops alone are built, and as no 
prudent native will consent to sleep above the ground 
floor, all the dwellings are low-studded structures. 
There are no interior courts, for there are neither trees, 
nor plants, nor vines to convert them into cool and 
shady retreats. The highest point of social distinction 
is reached when a resident builds on the plaza a square 
house of one story, and carries a railing around the flat- 
roof, with a line of benches where he and his family 
can sit and hear the band play waltzes in the cool of 
the evening. When that has been done, the highest 
prize in the lottery of existence has been won. 

These ports, while presenting to eyes unaccustomed 
to the scenery of a desert coast a Avretched and forlorn 
aspect, are centres of commercial activity. Copper, sil' 
ver, and nitrates are greater sources of national wealth 
than the wheat supplies of Talcahuano and the South. 



170 TROPICAL AMERICA 

Where a prominent mining-camp has been pitched a 
railway has been constructed either to Serena or to 
Copiap6, or directly to the seaboard; and the mineral 
deposits when unearthed are exported from the coast in 
enormous quantities. The Copiap6 country was for- 
merly the richest of the silver-producing districts, and 
is still a great mining centre. Serena is the seat of 
copper as well as silver mining. Chili once regulated 
the price of copper in the London market ; but it has 
lost its supremacy through the development of richer 
mines in the United States. Its capitalists are now 
making great efforts to enlarge the production by the 
introduction of improved methods of mining and smelt- 
ing; and they have succeeded within a few years in 
demonstrating the incorrectness of the assumption that 
the best and richest veins had been worked out. It 
may be a barren coast ; but the maritime range is brim- 
ming with treasure for a race which has the pluck to 
maintain an unequal combat with nature. 

The same natural causes which have converted the 
coast into a desert have stored it with wealth. The 
vast accumulations of guano and nitrate of soda could 
not have been formed in any other than a rainless zone. 
The retention of the fertilizing properties of these de- 
posits is entirely due to the absence of moisture. The 
cotton, sugar, and grazing valleys of Peru are enriched 
by rains on the Andean slopes. The islands and desert 
levels are enriched by the lack of rain. Nature may 
be contradictory in its processes, but its purposes are 
always beneficent. It is the greed of men and nations 
that converts nature's bounty into a blight and a curse. 
Guano and nitrates have been the chief cause of all the 
evils wrought by rapacious speculators, reckless finan- 



THE RAINLESS COAST 171 

ciers, and hostile armies on this coast. Peru was pros- 
perous and happy until this source of national wealth 
was developed on a large scale. When it was discov- 
ered that the manure deposits had only to be worked in 
order to yield enormous revenues, agricultural and min- 
ing industries were suffered to decline. A great railway 
system was planned, and reckless expenditures were 
sanctioned. The bondholders came in, and the re- 
sources of the rainless coast were mortgaged to them. 
The discovery of the nitrate beds of Tarapacd tended 
to depreciate the value of guano, and the Peruvian Gov- 
ernment established a monopoly over them. Chili had 
been coveting these resources of the coast and intriguing 
for the control of the nitrate industry at Antofagasta. 
The war of conquest was brought on under various pre- 
texts ; but it would never have been fought if the rainless 
coast had not been imbedded with nitrogeneous deposits. 
It was the same rich seaboard which provided the vic- 
torious Congressional faction during the recent Civil 
"War with a base of operations, where, secure against 
attack, they could recruit an army of sturdy miners 
with the revenues of the nitrate shipments. 

Antofagasta is one of the main gateways by which 
Bolivia is approached. It lies on the edge of the Ata- 
cama desert, which extends from the Cordilleras to the 
sea. Once in ten years there may be a heavy rain in 
this barren land, and then the deserts are clothed with 
lower forms of stunted vegetation for a brief space ; but 
during the remaining nine years there will hardly be a 
shower from January to December. Water is- obtained 
mainly by distillation and is sold at high prices and 
delivered from house to. house every morning. A more 
desolate-looking town could not be found on any save 



172 TROPICAL AMERICA 

a rainless coast. There is a small churcli on a bleak 
plaza, and there are drinking-saloons, and rows of frame 
houses of the plainest sort. The most ambitious deco- 
rative effect in the architecture of the town is the paint- 
ing of a wooden front in imitation of a brick wall. 
This is Antofagasta, one of the great prizes of the 
war of devastation fought for the possession of the 
nitrate beds. 

A high, angry surf beats against the rocky shore on 
Avhich Tquique is built. There is only an open, unpro- 
tected roadstead where anchorage would be dangerous if 
the Pacific were not the calmest and most trustworthy 
of seas. The boatmen in landing passengers from 
steamers follow a circuitous passage between ledges 
of rock over which the surf rushes with tremendous 
force. Fortunate is the traveller who passes through 
the breakers without a shower bath ; but even with 
coat and hat copiously sprinkled with salt water, he is 
thankful to have escaped the upsetting of the boat, 
which has seemed imminent at the most dangerous 
point. The background for these lines of foaming 
breakers is a series of barren mountains bordered by 
a desert. Straggling along the curves of the shore are 
rows of low -frame-houses, drinking-saloons, and shops, 
separated by broad streets. Where the sandy level is 
widest, at the base of the sloping flanks of the coast 
range, the streets are multiplied until homes are pro- 
vided for a population of 20,000, with an additional 
5000 in the suburbs of the district. Iquique, with its 
unnatural surroundings and the striking disadvantages 
of its wretched harbor, is the largest and most flourish- 
ing coast-town between Valparaiso and Callao. In 
commercial importance it ranks after Valparaiso, since 



THE RAINLESS COAST 173 

it is the centre of the nitrate trade. Pisagua is becom- 
ing a formidable rival to it, and the extension of the 
railway in the interior may render Patillos an important 
nitrate port. Nature has dried up the sources of life and 
verdure on the sterile hillsides and scattered fragments 
of ancient seawall in the roadstead. Nature has also 
stored in the deserts treasures which are apparently 
inexhaustible. 

Iquique is the chief port of the province of Tarapacd, 
which was formerly the southernmost district of Peru. 
Crude nitrate of soda was discovered about 1830, and 
the first shipment was made in 1833 to England. It 
was used in the manufacture of nitric acid 'and also as 
a fertilizer, and the quantity exported from Iquique in- 
creased rapidly to 7,084,766 quintals in 1878, the year 
preceding the outbreak of the war. In consequence of 
excessive production both the European and American 
markets were overstocked and the price heavily de- 
clined after the war. The Chilian producers united 
in an agreement to limit the exports until the surplus 
could be worked off and better prices secured. In 
1887 there was a revival of the nitrate industry in con- 
sequence of a larger foreign demand, and the exports 
of salts increased in value to 20,606,454 quintals in 
1889. These figures reveal the rapid development of 
the nitrate industry under Chilian administration of the 
province of Tarapacd. 

The deposits are not found on the western slopes of 
the maritime range, but at the foot of the opposite 
flanks of the mountains. On the western edge of the 
wide valley between the central chain of the Andes 
and the coast range there are low foot-hills. There 
only are the beds of nitrate salts. The most reasonable 



174 TROPICAL AMERICA 

explanation of their existence presupposes the conver- 
sion of the West Coast from sea-bottom to mountain 
and valley. As the coast range emerged by volcanic 
action above the sea, salt water lagoons filled with sea- 
weed and marine vegetation would naturally have been 
left between it and the main Andean wall. The de- 
composition of the seaweed would have released nitric 
acid to enter into combination with shells and chalky 
limestone, and the gradual evaporation of the salt 
water would have produced these nitrogeneous deposits. 
Probably the whole valley was originally embedded 
with nitrate, but the deposits were washed away in the 
centre and on the western slope of the Andes. The 
masses which remain were protected by the conforma- 
tion of the low coast range. If this belt had not been 
rainless for thousands of years, these wonderful accu- 
mulations would not have been preserved, for atmos- 
pheric moisture would have destroyed them. The 
wealth of the nitrate coast is the direct result of 
the natural conditions which deprive it of verdure and 
agricultural resources. This is a fact which reconciles 
Chilian and foreign residents alike to their life in a 
coast Sahara. The Pampa del Tamarugal has the out- 
ward aspects of a barren valley of death ; but it is a 
vast chemical laboratory in which life-giving elements 
are stored in inexhaustible supplies for renewing the 
productive energies of other climes. Only the richest 
beds are now worked, but the deposits extend along 
the coast for many hundreds of miles. There are sup- 
plies adequate for the requirements of centuries of suc- 
cessful agriculture in Europe and America. 

The wonderful development of the salt industries is 
largely to be attributed to the enterprise of Colonel 



THE RAINLESS COAST 175. 

North, known along this coast as the Nitrate King. He 
has amassed a great fortune since the war between 
Chili and Peru, and now resides in London, where he 
largely controls the nitrate market. He was an intelli- 
gent engineer who had surveyed the salt beds of Tara- 
pacd, and formed an accurate estimate of the mineral 
wealth of the region. The Peruvian government had 
established a State monopoly before the war, purchasing 
the nitrate lands and works, and issuing bonds for 
them. At the close of the hostilities it was generally 
expected that Chili would maintain a similar monopoly, 
but the victorious Government wisely decided to open the 
industry to free competition and to content itself with 
receiving an export duty on the product. Colonel 
North began operations by purchasing bonds issued by . 
the Peruvian government, and after securing control 
of nitrate beds, he formed companies in England for 
working them. He also bought the stock of some of the 
nitrate railways at depreciated rates and organized new 
companies for operating and extending them. The 
Chilian government encouraged him to persevere in 
his operations, and made no attempt to interfere with 
the rights of private owners interested in the develop- 
ment of the resources of the coast. The administration 
in Iquique and Tarapaca has steadily improved since 
the conquest, and the population is reconciled to the 
new political order which has promoted the material 
progress of a province that was in a state of stagnation 
before the war. Many of the Peruvian residents have 
sold their property and gone north, but there has been 
an influx of new settlers from Chili of superior ca- 
pacity and enterprise. The railway system has been 
extended, new factories have been built, and the 



176 TROPICAL AMERICA 

province has received a great impetus under Chilian 
administration. 

Iquique has played an important part in the last two 
West Coast wars. The decisive sea-fight of the war with 
Peru occurred in the harbor. While the Chilians were 
blockading Callao, the Peruvian iron-clads, the Inde- 
pendencia and the Huascar^ headed southward, possibly 
with the intention of bombarding Valparaiso. At 
Iquique they encountered two contemptible adversaries, 
the wooden ship Esmeralda, with eight, and the little 
gunboat Covadonga, with two guns. The Hiiascar, 
well handled by her commander, soon had the Esmeralda 
at her mercy. The Chilian commander attempted to 
capture the Huascar by running his own ship alongside 
and screaming to his men to board her and use their 
knives. The vessels were separated before his crew 
could follow him as he sprang to the enemy's deck. He 
was instantly shot down, and his ship sank to the bottom 
with her crew of eighty men, a few survivors alone 
escaping. This was the daring exploit for which 
Arturo Prat's statue is raised in Valparaiso and else- 
where in Chili. If the sea-fight had ended with the 
sinking of his own vessel, the Peruvian ships might have 
proceeded on their course to Valparaiso and shelled the 
town. The real hero of the sea-fight was the shrewd 
commander of the Covadonga, who when followed by 
the Independencia, a ship which outsailed the gunboat 
and would have been certain to overtake her, was crafty 
as Ulysses, and ran close in shore. The Independencia 
went aground on the rocks and was a total wreck. It 
was a staggering blow, from which Peru never re- 
covered. 

The same nitrate coast was the centre of the Con- 



THE RAINLESS COAST 177 

gressional operations during the Civil War of 1891. All 
the skirmishes by which the insurgents secured posses- 
sion of the province of Tarapacd and control over more 
than one-half of the revenues of Chili took place along 
the line of railway connecting Pisagua with Iquique. 
As most of the railways were operated and the nitrate 
deposits worked by companies formed and registered in 
England, the sympathies of that country were largely 
enlisted on the side of the insurgents, especially as 
Balraaceda, whether justly or unjustly, was suspected 
of harboring a design of depriving foreigners of a great 
source of wealth and of converting the salt beds into 
State properties. The overthrow of the Dictator could 
never have been accomplished without the possession of 
Iquique and its army of miners. It was the victory of 
Tarapac4 over Central Chili. Until a coast railway 
providing rapid means for transporting an army is 
built from Valparaiso to Iquique no future government 
in Santiago will be secure against insurrection in the 
North. 

The Chilian flag, as it floats above the high rock 
which guards the entrance of Arica, is a signal that the 
frontier has been established north of the nitrate desert 
for all time. The little Peruvian fort which was 
captured after Tarapaca had been overrun and Tacna 
occupied with a land force is still garrisoned, and the 
guns point outward toward the sea, where the Chilians 
are as aggressive in commerce to-day as they were then 
in naval warfare. This is the last port on the coast 
where the flag is seen ; and nominally it is temporarily 
occupied pending a popular vote in 1893, which will 
determine whether Tacna and Arica shall be restored to 
Peru or annexed permanently to Chili. The sum of 



178 TROPICAL AMERICA 

$10,000,000 in silver is to be paid by the nation which 
finally obtains the provinces to the loser. Arica will 
be held by Chili whether the price be paid or not. Ten 
years of occupation with the military garrisons strength- 
ened at the time of the election will secure a vote in 
its favor. As in Iquique, so also in Arica, the Peruvian 
residents are gradually selling their possessions, and 
Chilians are taking their places. Moreover, an increase 
in trade is shown by the number of vessels constantly 
to be seen in the roadstead, and there is a band always 
plajdng in the plaza in the evenings to amuse the 
people. Arica, while not making as rapid strides in 
material advancement as the chief nitrate ports, Pisagua 
and Iquique, is steadily gaining ground. The Chilian 
flag will remain over the mimic fortress after the de- 
cisive election. The South will fight a second time 
rather than lose the frontier provinces. Chili will not 
give up any territory which has been conquered. Its 
loss would also be civilization's loss, for it is the most 
capable and progressive nation in the South. 

From Arica, where there is a sharp turn in the trend 
of the west coast, there is a marked change in the scen- 
ery. The high-terraced seawall of Northern Chili gives 
place in Southern Peru to sandy barrens and low-lying 
cliffs, with gray mountains sloping easily toward the 
shore. It is a bleak, inhospitable coast, the wider pros- 
pects which it brings before the eye being vistas of 
desert, with here and there a river bottom of rank weeds 
and a languishing village. Such a landing-place is 
MoUendo, with a straggling group of adobe cabins. A 
splendid destiny was marked out for it by Mr. Meiggs, 
but it has not entered upon its promised estate. Its 
prominence as the coast base of the longest railway in 



THE RAINLESS COAST 179 

Peru secured for it during the war of invasion an early 
visitation from Chilian marauding troops, and wanton 
destruction of engineering works and rolling-stock. 
General Caceres, afterwards President of Peru, was in 
the interior above Arequipa for a long time resisting 
the terms of the ignominious peace which General 
Iglesias had negotiated. This district was almost the 
last to be pacified, and the railway was not reopened 
for a long period. This line illustrated at once Mr. 
Meiggs's genius and folly. It was a magnificent engi- 
neering work which demonstrated in advance the prac- 
ticability of the Alpine railways and tunnels. It was a 
barren business enterprise, since it began at a coast vil- 
lage where there was no harbor, and ended 327 miles 
away in a lake settlement of possibly 5000 Indians. 
The railway system was built at a contract price of 
$44,000,000 in bonds. An attempt was made to open 
a trade route with Bolivia by establishing a line of 
steamers on Lake Titicaca at a level of 12,500 feet 
above the sea ; but it has yielded barren returns owing 
to the lack of rapid communication between the end of 
the lake and La Paz. Mr. Meiggs designed a third 
railway between Juliaca, near Pano, and Cuzco, a dis- 
tance of 272 miles. Only a small section of this line 
has been completed. The southern railway system does 
not tap any great producing districts. It runs through 
a sparsely populated country, offering no facilities for 
developing a remunerative transportation trade. 

From Southern Peru, after a voyage of three days, I 
reached Callao. This town was once the centre of the 
trade of the West Coast. The Pacific Navigation Com- 
pany made it the headquarters of their fleet of steamers, 
establishing there extensive repair shops, foundries, and 



180 TROPICAL AMERICA 

depots of supplies, and employing a force of 200 English 
mechanics, for whom houses, a hospital, and even a 
theatre were built. It is an unerring sign of the com- 
mercial decadence of Callao that the Company are 
transferring their machine shops from the Peruvian to 
the Chilian coast. The commeice and population of the 
town have steadily declined since the collapse of the 
guano business. Callao has ceased to be a terminal 
point of the first importance for European commerce. 
Its population was once 40,000 ; it can now hardly exceed 
25,000. There is an exceptionally good harbor for the 
coast, and it has been deepened and improved by a French 
company. There are moles where vessels can receive 
cargoes ; there is a large floating dock ; there is a sea- 
wall nearly a mile long of substantial construction ; 
there are steam cranes for loading and discharging car- 
goes and railway tracks leading nearly to the ends of 
the piers ; and there is anchorage ground for the largest 
ships. Facilities are provided for handling an immense 
commerce. There are all the mechanical appliances 
and engineering works required for making Callao 
a metropolis. Business alone is lacking. On the 
rainless coast one constantly sees dry river-beds where 
there are fine channels for running water and sharp 
curves and rugged gorges in the coast mountains offer- 
ing a promise of bold scener3^ Only one thing is 
wanting — water. At Callao there are channels hol- 
lowed out and scientifically improved for floating a 
great commerce ; but there seems to be no business.' 
The town is stagnant. All its commercial and indus- 
trial interests are depressed. 

The chief cause for the commercial decadence of Cal- 
lao is the exhaustion of the resources of the country 



THE RAINLESS COAST 181 

produced by the war with Chili. Peru was completely- 
crushed. Its seaboard had been ravaged ; many of its 
towns were heaps of charred ruins ; and its capital was 
only saved from destruction by the energy of the for- 
eign residents. The government was bankrupt. For 
years it had been dependent upon the guano beds for 
revenues, and these sources of wealth had passed out 
of its possession. It was compelled by its necessities to 
continue the issue of irredeemable currency, which was 
already worth only a fraction of its face value. It went 
on inflating the currency until there was a volume 
variously estimated from 80,000,000 to 100,000,000, 
and an actual value of a few cents on the dollar. With 
such a medium of exchange business operations could 
not be extended. It was not till the currency became 
worthless and was cast aside with one consent by the 
people in the coast towns that there was any real 
improvement in the situation. Momentarily, the repu- 
diation of the currency involved great distress in the 
interior, where the natives had no money with which to 
buy food ; but the substitution of silver for paper was 
rapidly effected, and from that time there has been a 
partial restoration of business confidence. The unfin- 
ished railway system has been one of the chief obstacles 
to material progress. Lack of capital available for new 
enterprises has been another hindrance. Peru had 
stopped paying the interest .on its public debt, and 
thereby had fatally impaired its credit. Its most urgent 
need was foreign capital, but its borrowing powers had 
completely collapsed. 

Callao is the seaboard base of the second of Mr. 
Meiggs's great railways. I went over the line to the ter- 
minus after enjoying for ten days the delightful society 



182 TEOPICAL AMERICA 

of the capital. The secrets of the Andes cannot be 
snatched in a game of blindman's-buff on a railway- 
train. The traveller who goes to Chicla with an im- 
pression that he can see grand mountain scenery by 
shifting his seat from one side of the car to the other, 
and by occasionally venturing outside on the platform, 
is doomed to disappointment. Mr. Hubbell, superin- 
tendent of the railway, to whom I had been introduced 
through the courtesy of Mr. Eyre, in Lima, had promised 
that I should return by hand-car without a cinder-puff- 
ing engine in front. I waited until there was a clear sky 
above me, and then saw the Oroya railway. Mr. Ellis, 
the roadmaster, sent for me at eleven o'clock and told 
me that the carriage was waiting. It was a narrow box 
with two seats over four wheels. A brake worked by a 
small hand-lever was the only appliance for controlling 
it. This sufficed for stopping the hand-car in the course 
of a few yards, even when the motion was as high as 
thirty miles an hour. Six passengers with the road- 
master made a full load, but gravity is a steed which is 
at its best when it has something to pull. The wheels 
were oiled and critically examined; the baggage was 
readjusted so as to inconvenience the passengers as 
little as possible ; and then the grip of the brake was 
released. In an instant the car was in rapid motion 
down the Cordilleras from an elevation of 12,220 feet. 
In a few minutes more it was running at the rate of 
twenty miles an hour, and if Mr. Ellis had been anxious 
to put his pony through its best paces, a speed of thirty- 
five miles might have been attained on the safer levels. 
The simplicity of the engineering methods of this 
railway was now revealed. Projecting terraces or but- 
tresses along the valley of the Rimac have been utilized 



THE RAINLESS COAST 183 

for the construction of a series of ascending zigzags. 
There are no spiral curves above Matucana, but there is 
a continuous succession of grades one above another. 
The roadmaster jumps off, readjusts a switch, and then 
starts the car in the opposite direction. The Rimac, 
which before was a foaming torrent a long way below 
us, is now almost on a level with the car. The tunnel 
through which we passed recedes from view and at last 
disappears altogether. The roadmaster again alights to 
switch the car upon a third grade. Now the first direc- 
tion is resumed, and before long the tunnel through 
which we had plunged on the first grade is again seen, 
this time high above us. As one looks down another 
tunnel can be descried at a lower level. This will be 
reached by a backward run on an intermediate grade, 
and then by an advance in the opposite direction. The 
lines of ascent and descent are distinctly traced as we 
pass from one level to another. There is one mountain 
mass which is approached as many as five times on suc- 
cessive grades, and then a tunnel pierces it, and sends 
the car trundling down the precipices on the other side. 
From Chicla to Rio Blanco, with its reaches of white 
water, there is a descent of 677 feet in three and one- 
half miles ; and thence to Puente de Anchi there is one 
of 243 feet in two miles. The gradients are uniform 
from the base of the Cordilleras, and in no instance do 
they exceed one in twenty-six, the average being con- 
siderably lower. The Rimac and other streams are 
crossed and recrossed by bridges and viaducts of slender 
construction and ingenious design. At Puente Infier- 
nillo there are double tunnels, with the river pouring out 
of a subterranean cleft, and the mountains towering in 
desolate majesty to a great height. A bridge spans a 



184 TROPICAL AIVIERICA 

torrent at the bottom of the ravine. On the mountain 
sides, which are here nearly vertical, there are evidences 
of the stupendous forces by which nature has hollowed 
out this infernal chamber in the Cordilleras. Rock 
masses have been riven apart and shattered. The foam- 
ing torrent has undermined the base of the mountain. 
A chasm which seemed to defy human approach has 
been walled in on every side by precipitous buttresses ; 
yet at the bottom of the ravine trains pass over a light 
railway bridge, and appear and disappear at the mouths 
of companion tunnels. From Puente de Anchi to San 
Mateo the railway follows a winding pathway along the 
verges of precipices. Tunnels are frequent and viaducts 
seem to be suspended like cobwebs in the air. At San 
Mateo there are magnificent mountain prospects at an 
elevation of 10,530 feet. In fourteen and one-half miles 
there is a descent of 2742 feet by a series of long curves 
and zigzags. Below Matucana there are two complete 
spirals by which the car successively reaches points 
directly below each other. Here was the object lesson 
by which railway engineers profited in constructing the 
St. Gothard and other Alpine lines. 

At Verrugas the hand-car was switched off on a 
siding and abandoned. The brook at the bottom of the 
ravine is ordinarily a thin, silvery stream ; but when 
a cloudburst occurred a year before, the gorge, with its 
precipitous walls, was suddenly converted into a high 
flood, which swept down upon the bridge, the most 
conspicuous work of engineering on the line so far as 
it is completed. The bridge had three iron piers, the 
central one being 252 feet high, with the span of the 
chasm, 580 feet in width. The torrent carried away 
the middle pier and with it a mass of wreckage. For 



». f»4.» *; A«*Ai;^* 




THE KAINLESS COAST 185 

several months traffic was suspended beyond Verrugas, 
and mules were put on the road to Chicla. Then Yan- 
kee ingenuity devised a method of surmounting the 
obstacle of the broken bridge. Cables were swung 
across the chasm, and a small car working on pulleys 
was attached to them. As our party of seven approached 
the side pier a hanging platform, with two braces 
hooked to the pulleys, was in use for transferring 
freight from one bank to the other. There was no 
time for substituting the regular passenger box for this 
rough contrivance. We scrambled up, and were swung 
across the chasm, the hanging platform tilting with the 
load. The most serious traveller of the party could 
not help smiling over the drollery of this swinging ride 
over a dangerous gorge, and every one breathed more 
easily when the wheels ceased to move and the open 
cage could be emptied. A second hand-car was then 
taken, and the journey down the mountains was con- 
tinued to San Bartholom^, and thence to Chosica. 
Lima was then only twenty-five miles distant. 

Mr. Meiggs had an ambition to leave behind him 
some magnificent work achieved under stupendous dif- 
ficulties. The Oroya Railroad is his title to fame writ- 
ten in spiral curves and zigzags across the Cordilleras. 
It was undertaken as a marvel of modern engineering, 
by which Peru might be brought into a conspicuous 
place among the nations, and its reputation as the most 
backward and mediaeval of South American countries 
redeemed. Even in its unfinished state,-it is a monu- 
ment to his genius and the most important public work 
in Peru. As originally planned in 1870, it was to 
tunnel the Andes at an altitude of 15,645 feet above the 
sea, after a long series of zigzags and curves on the 



186 TEOPICAL AMERICA 

terraces of the upper Rimac. No other engineer would 
have ventured to forecast the operation of a piston-rod 
at so great a height. No other contractor would have 
seriously considered the practicability of building a 
railway across the mountains to a few huddles of Indian 
cabins and obtaining remunerative financial returns 
from it. There were other points in central Peru, at 
which the Cordilleras could have been pierced at a 
greatly reduced level, and with less formidable engineer- 
ing difficulties. Mr. Meiggs, in his way, was as auto- 
cratic as the Russian Czar, who upset the careful 
calculations of his engineers by drawing a straight line 
across the map and ordering them to take that as their 
route. Oroya seems to have been chosen as the ter- 
minus of the greatest of the Peruvian railways for no 
apparent reason except Mr. Meiggs's imperious caprice. 
It is possible that Mr. Meiggs, in planning his moun- 
tain and coast railways, was swayed by emulation of 
the achievements of the Inca engineers before the 
Spanish conquest. They built the most ingenious roads 
over the Cordilleras, the remains of which are still to 
be seen, and they spanned the widest rivers with rope 
bridges. The Inca Empire, at the height of its power, 
extended from the equator to what is now central 
Chili. In order to facilitate the march of armies, and 
the development of native industries, the conquering 
race built highways in the mountain plateaus inland, 
from Quito to Cuzco and Titicaca, and thence into 
Bolivia. With equal skill works of irrigation, by which 
the coast valleys of Peru were kept under a high state 
of cultivation, were devised, and so well built that 
portions of them are in use to-day in the vineyards and 
cotton plantations of Peru. The Incas were the great- 



THE RAINLESS COAST 187 

est and most practical road-makers of antiquity. They 
did not construct their public works where there was 
no traffic, but where highways were needed in order 
to connect the centres of their wonderful civilization. 
Where irrigation was of more importance than a road- 
way they built dams at successive elevations of moun- 
tain streams, and reservoirs for the storage of water; 
and lower down they trenched the gorges of the sierras 
and dug long canals in the valleys. Mr. Meiggs and 
his associates were less practical in their methods than 
the Incas. One-half of the money expended on rail- 
ways, if it had been applied to irrigation works, would 
have transformed a barren coast into fertile plantations 
and blooming gardens. With practical wisdom in locat- 
ing the railway routes, the trade of Peru might have 
been concentrated in two or three ports, instead of 
being scattered among twenty fishing villages, and the 
premature building of costly mountain railways which 
have no terminal points except insignificant Indian 
settlements would have been avoided altogether. 

These costly works were undertaken under the stim- 
ulative effect of the guano speculations upon which the 
government had entered. The national revenues had 
been largely increased and reckless expenditures were 
incurred under the impression that the coast manures 
and salts would prove inexhaustible sources of wealth. 
Mr. Meiggs was the evil genius of Peru during the 
period when borrowing was easy. His own contracts 
amounted to $133,000,000, and his premature death left 
all his enterprises in inextricable confusion. The State, 
after investing $140,000,000 in railways, during an in- 
credibly short period, was overwhelmed with war and 
financial embarrassment. The bondholders, after re- 



188 TROPICAL AlVIERTCA 

ceiving no interest for fourteen years, have finally 
been placed in possession of the unfinished railways. 
The national debt has been paid by the surrender of 
all the State railways to the English creditors. 

Peru is to-day in liquidation. Devastated by war, 
despoiled of territories and the treasui'e of its rainless 
coast, bankrupt in resources, crushed, prostrate, and 
despairing, it has been restored by the efforts of one 
man to life and hope. At the close of the disastrous 
campaign with Chili, its towns were in ruins, its rail- 
ways were wellnigh destroyed, and its industries were 
paral3^zed. The country was racked with political 
feuds and rent with civil war. Each new government 
created by revolution or military cabal was powerless 
to restore financial stability. Railways were arbitrarily 
seized in defiance of vested rights. There was not a 
financier, either in Europe or in America, so credulous 
as to lend money to Peru on any terms. Without the 
aid of large masses of foreign capital, the industries of 
the country seemed destined to languish for -an indefi- 
nite period. Under deplorable conditions of national 
bankruptcy and commercial depression, the future of 
Peru seemed hopeless. But there was one man who 
did not cease to hope, even when every one else 
despaired. For five years he was swayed by the 
honorable ambition of rescuing the country from its 
calamitous condition by a master-stroke of finance and 
diplomacy. Baffled many times by the fierce resent- 
ments created by the war between Chili and Peru, and 
constantly embarrassed by counter-intrigues from rival 
groups of financiers which had support from political 
factions, he persevered in his undertaking with inex- 
haustible reserves of patience and courage until success 



THE EAINLESS COAST 189 

crowned his efforts. The entire foreign debt, amount- 
ing in interest and principal to $295,000,000, was liqui- 
dated by a contract sanctioned by the legislative cham- 
bers. The bondholders, in return for this discharge of 
indebtedness, have received ten State railways, with the 
privilege of operating them for sixty-six years, and the 
obligation to extend them 323 kilometers during six 
years. They have also obtained control of important 
mining properties, and a monopoly of the guano busi- 
ness in Chili and Peru for four years, and a large share 
in the working of the best beds for a longer period. 
They are armed with many other concessions and privi- 
leges, which are expected to yield them an immediate 
income and large prospective profits. The transaction 
is one of tremendous magnitude, and has established 
the reputation of Michael P. Grace as a financier. 

It was in 1885 that Mr. Grace became possessed with 
the idea that a financial settlement could be effected by 
which Peruvian credit and prosperity might be reestab- 
lished on a permanent basis, and the interests of foreign 
capitalists protected and rendered productive. He was 
convinced that the opposition of Chili, which had proved 
fatal to the previous agreements, could be counteracted. 
He returned to London, became associated with Lord 
Donoughmore, one of the leading bondholders, and 
received full power of attorney to represent them in 
negotiations at Santiago and Lima. The jealousies and 
resentments of the two nations operated in opposite 
directions. Chili was unwilling to make any conces- 
sions to the bondholders, or to enter into any dealings 
with them, but insisted upon treating with Peru on the 
basis of the Treaty of Ancon. Peru desired to negoti- 
ate directly with the bondholders, and to have nothing 



190 TROPICAL AMERICA 

to do with Chili. Fine diplomatic work was required 
in order to effect the general result of settling the 
guano claims against Chili, putting Peru into liquida- 
tion, and transferring its railways and other property to 
the bondholders. The settlement was brought about 
toward the close of 1889, in the form of a protocol dis- 
posing of various questions left open in the Treaty of 
Ancon. Chili persisted to the end in refusing to recog- 
nize the bondholders, but virtually made concessions to 
them, while assuming the attitude of befriending Peru, 
and of enabling it to reorganize its shattered finances. 

These concessions cleared the ground for final action 
upon the new contract which Lord Donoughmore mean- 
while had been pressing upon the attention of the 
government of Peru. President Caceres advocated its 
acceptance ; but three successive Congresses rejected it. 
Then followed a characteristic episode in South Ameri- 
can politics. A number of elections were invalidated, 
the seats of the members were declared vacant, and 
special elections were ordered and carried by the gov- 
ernment. With the help of the new members the con- 
tract was ratified on October 7, 1889. The President 
signed the act, which was officially promulgated on 
January 11, 1890. By the terms of the Grace contract 
Peru is absolutely released from all responsibility for 
the loans of 1869, 1870, and 1872. This debt was in- 
curred in the construction of railways, and the bulk of 
it was secured by the guano deposits which have been 
in the possession of Chili. The total debt, in round 
numbers, was $160,000,000, on which no interest had 
been paid since 1876. This was exclusive of $100,- 
000,000, of irredeemable paper currency, which had 
virtually been repudiated. The arrears of interest 



THE RAINLESS COAST 191 

amounted at the time of the settlement to $135,000,- 
000, making the aggregate indebtedness, principal and 
interest, -f 295,000,000. This has been wiped out by the 
contract. Peru, unable to pay its public debt, sur- 
rendered the railways which were built with the loans 
of 1870 and 1872. Its government has practically said 
to the bondholders : " Take the railways, operate "them 
and complete them, so as to render them profitable ; 
and take also Peru's claims against Chili for the guano 
and nitrate beds mortgaged to you. Cancel the debt 
when we have given up to you everything we have. 
Bring new capital and enterprise into the country, and 
enable us to live and prosper." 

The bondholders under the contract acquire posses- 
sion of 764 miles of railway in actual operation, and 
are required to extend the southern system 51 miles 
to Sicuani within four years, and the central system 
49 miles, from Chicla to Oroya, within three years, 
and, in addition, to build within six years 100 miles of 
new road, either on the coast lines or in connection 
with the two main systems. These extensions are com- 
pulsory under penalty of fines and forfeiture of certain 
lines; but the bondholders are at liberty to build as 
many additional sections as they choose. Even with 
these extensions, the railway system will hardly be 
more than half finished, and the richest mineral and 
agricultural regions will remain without direct com- 
munications with the coast. Oroya is an insignificant 
terminal point, and the central line can never be con- 
sidered completed until direct connections are made 
with Cerro de Pasco in the north and with the naviga- 
ble waters of the Amazon in the east. Marangani is a 
huddle of Indian huts, and Sicuani hardly more than 



192 TROPICAL AMERICA 

an Inca village market; and Cuzco will still remain 
isolated when the proposed extensions are made. Since 
the signing of the contract, concessions have been 
granted by the Peruvian government of the right to 
connect the southern railway system at Puno with the 
frontiers of Bolivia, and, also, the central railway sys- 
tem, when completed, with the navigable waters of the 
Amazon, with an additional land grant of 15,000 acres 
for every kilometer of railway built. A supplementary 
concession of 5,000,000 acres of land has also been 
sanctioned. The transfer of the famous Cerro de 
Pasco silver mines has been arranged for the benefit of 
the bondholders. Negotiations have been successfully 
conducted for concessions from the Bolivian govern- 
ment for a railway to be built in connection with the 
southern railway system, with land grants and subsi- 
dies. The government arms the bondholders with all 
the guano privileges obtained by the Chilian protocol. 

These are the main outlines of this liquidation 
scheme. That Mr. Grace and the bondholders, many 
of whom have purchased heavily depreciated securities, 
will enrich themselves, is probable. That they will also 
succeed, if not embarrassed by revolutionary intrigues, 
in rescuing Peru from its deplorable plight is credible. 
That English interests will be promoted at an ultimate 
sacrifice of American interests by this compromise is 
certain. The railways of Peru have been managed 
largely by Americans. These lines will henceforth be 
controlled by the English bondholders. According to 
the contract, the companies to be organized for carrying 
out the compromise, and for extending the railways and 
developing the mineral resources and guano deposits 
are to be English. There must be, in the natural order 



THE RAINLESS COAST 198 

of events, a decline of American interests in Peru. 
Mr. Meiggs and his associates created American pres- 
tige in Peru, but it was on the strength of capital bor- 
rowed in England. In the future Peru will inevitably 
rank with Brazil, Chili, and the Argentine among the 
commercial dependencies in England. The industrial 
revival of Peru was confidently predicted by all influen- 
tial men in Lima. Mr. Elmore, who had been Peruvian 
Minister at Washington, and was soon to be Minister of 
Foreign Affairs, remarked to me that only two men at 
all eminent in public life had expressed disapproval of 
the compromise with the bondholders. When foreign 
capital is supplied for the development of the mining 
and agricultural belts, and employment is found for 
thousands of workmen in the extension of the rail- 
ways, it seems reasonable to infer that the energies of 
the country will be revived, and that with an increase 
in prosperity the volume of the export and import 
trades will be restored. The United States will profit 
indirectly rather than directly from the bondholders' 
compromise. Prosperity in Peru will create a market 
there in which Americans can compete successfully 
with Europe if they will display maritime and mer- 
cantile energy. 



LIMA IN CARNIVAL WEEK 

A SATURNALIA OF PRACTICAL JOKING — BEAUTY OF THE 

"WOMEN A SHABBY BUT DELIGHTFUL CITY PAST AND 

PRESENT IN THE RIMAC VALLEY — MIRAFLORES AND 
CHORILLOS 

EoR three days after my arrival at Callao the floods 
clapped their hands along a rainless coast. Without a 
cloud in the sky water descended by the bucketful on 
the heads of unwary pedestrians, and shouts of merri 
ment were raised from roof and balcony where mischief- 
workers were entrenched. The revels of carnival week 
involve prodigal wastefulness in the use of water. 
Nature by withholding rain enforces all the year round 
lessons of restraint and economy. During the carnival 
there is a revolt against Nature and her wholesome 
discipline. Water is showered from the housetops with 
wanton extravagance. All classes join in the frolic. 
Practical joking is licensed, and business is practically 
suspended for three days. Social barriers are thrown 
down, and a spirit of democratic equality pervades the 
community. The chambermaid upsets a pitcher of 
water upon the head of the prosperous merchant as he 
leaves his house at the next door. The merchant's 
daughter plays a similar prank upon the beggar asking 
for alms in the street. 

When I arrived at Callao there Avas not a street where 
194 



LIMA IN CARNIVAL WEEK 195 

one was secure against attack from doorway, balcony, or 
roof. At Lima after crossing the Cathedral Plaza, two 
travelling companions, who were walking with me to the 
French and English hotel, were subjected to a shower 
bath. This was at noon of the third day. As the after- 
noon passed the sport increased in intensity, and every 
successful delivery from bucket or dipper was greeted 
with shouts of laughter. The servants in the hotel, 
men and women, at first had a general engagement in 
the inner courts and galleries, from which after much 
scuffling, scampering, and horseplay, they emerged wet 
to the skin, powdered with flour, and wildly hilarious. 
They then stationed themselves upon the roof, and for 
hours not a carriage, nor a mule-driver, nor a pedestrian 
went by Avithout being saluted in the approved carnival 
style. The street was wet from sidewalk to sidewalk, 
and everybody was warned of the danger with which he 
was menaced ; but few seemed disposed to turn into a 
safer quarter, and to avoid assault from the garrison of 
water-throwers. Horses were whipped up, and men and 
boys ran briskly by, dodging the showers when they 
could, and the victims when drenched laughed as 
heartily over their misfortunes as the bystanders under 
cover of the besiegers aloft. I saw hundreds of men 
and women showered in this way during the day ; but in 
no instance were there signs of resentment or anger. 
Dipper, pail, and pitcher, however, are coarse and 
clumsy weapons of the mimic warfare of the carnival. 
There are more refined instruments of torture known as 
ehisguetes. These are toys by which jets of water or 
perfume can be thrown directly into the eyes of an an- 
tagonist. Roughly dressed men, sauntering through the 
plaza, felt at liberty to open their batteries upon any one 



196 TROPICAL AMERICA 

passing by. There would be a quick movement of the 
assailant's hand, and a stream of water, often colored 
with pigment, would be discharged directly into the vic- 
tim's face. Ladies were attacked in this way and they 
only smiled grimly. King Carnival reigned. His sub- 
jects were on terms of equality. With the Lenten 
strains in the churches social distinctions would be re- 
stored. Meanwhile there was a saturnalia of practical 
joking. 

The prosperous classes and foreigners seemed to enjoy 
heartily the social relaxation of the Peruvian carnival. 
The romping extended to circles where etiquette and 
conventional propriety were ordinarily most exacting. 
Men and women in private houses engaged in pitched 
battles with water-jugs and paint-brushes, drenching 
one another with improvised shower-baths, painting 
faces and dyeing hair, dashing cologne into the eyes, 
and spending the evening in making guys of themselves. 
Lest this may seem exaggeration, I may add that it is a 
condensed description of a night of revelry in one of the 
most fashionable houses, as I received it at breakfast on 
Ash Wednesday from one of the chief merrymakers, who 
closed his account by remarking that it surprised him 
every year to observe how completely the conventional 
ideas of social decorum were relaxed during carnival 
week. Lent, with its litanies and doleful music, puts an 
end to all social license. Men and women meet again 
under the restraints which are ordinarily maintained, 
and nowhere in South America are the proprieties of 
life more rigorously enforced than in Lima. 

The women of the upper circles in the Peruvian 
capital have always been famous for their beauty. There 
is a practical way of testing such a tradition as this. 



LIMA IN CARNIVAL WEEK 197 

The photographers' show-cases contain large collections 
of the beautiful women of Lima. There is not another 
city in South America where such comely and refined 
faces are brought under the traveller's eyes. The con- 
tour is one of their chief charms. It is a delicately 
curved oval, with dark, deep-set eyes, and black, glossy 
hair. Most of the photographs in the show-cases are 
taken in full dress, and disclose the graceful figure and 
lovely arms for which the high-bred women of Lima 
have been famous for generations. The sun is an artist 
whose judgment in such matters is entitled to the 
highest respect ; but lest it may be thought that I am 
placing too much dependence upon photographs, a 
second test may be mentioned. Every afternoon trains 
of ten or twelve cars, carrying hundreds of fair travel- 
lers, leave the three railway stations at various hours 
for the seaside bathing resorts. There the beauty and 
fashion of the capital are displayed, and the evidence of 
the photographs is fully sustained. Two additional 
charms are to be noted — small and daintily shaped feet, 
and low, musical voices. The constant play of expres- 
sion in a well-bred Lima lady's face, when she is talking 
with a friend, is not the least among her attractions. 

In olden days the women of Lima had a characteris- 
tic dress to set off their physical charms. This was a 
close-fitting skirt, in later times made full, and a man- 
tle fastened at the waist, brought over the head and 
held with the hand so as to show one eye. This cos- 
tume made the dark, fascinating eye and the shapely 
arm conspicuous ; but it covered the lovely contour of 
the face. It is never seen now ; but there is a reminis- 
cence of it in the embroidered manta. The tapada was 
practically a mask with which to conceal the face, and 



198 TKOPICAL AiyiERICA 

these Lima beauties had no cause to do that. It was, 
moreover, a costume lacking in individuality, like the 
black gowns and mantas now worn by women of every 
class when they go to church. The fireflies that have 
been flashing their beauty in the revels of carnival 
week are black crickets during Lent, chirping their 
Ave Marias and prayers from the pavements of the 
musty churches. 

It was fortunate, perhaps, that I saw so many of the 
handsome women of Lima in the Chorillos and Callao 
trains, for otherwise my faith in the sun's trustworthi- 
ness, as disclosed in the photographers' rooms, would 
have been disturbed, after contrasting the pictures of 
the churches with the buildings themselves. In photo- 
graphs these temples are wonderful examples of ornate 
architecture, with f aQades of intricate tracery and delicate 
carving. In reality the churches are debased speci- 
mens of elaborately ornamented Renaissance architec- 
ture, with mud, bamboo, and plaster as the building 
materials, tricked out with innumerable images, statues, 
marble columns, and a meretricious blur of contrasting 
colors. Possibly the cathedral may be reserved as pos- 
sessing some effective features, when one is some dis- 
tance away, so as to lose sight of the little statuettes, 
turrets, and red marble pillars, and to see only the sil- 
houette of its massive towers and broad Gothic nave 
projected against a yellow sunset sky ; but San Pedro, 
San Francisco, La Merced, and all the other adobe 
churches and convents, with their ostentatious plaster 
cloisters, domes, and timber towers, and their compli- 
cated fronts of painted stucco work and f uss}'" carving, are 
irredeemably bad from every point of view. Some of 
the interiors are imposing, as, for example, the nave of San 



LIMA IN CARNIVAL WEEK 199 

Francisco, with its lofty arches ; but the exteriors, with 
the stucco fronts and the gaudily painted towers, in start- 
ling combinations of red, black, yellow, and blue, are 
simply vile, venerable though the religious associations 
connected with them may be. Nothing could be more 
misleading than a photograph of a Lima church ; and on 
this account the women of the city, who are really beau- 
tiful, are placed at a serious disadvantage when their 
faces are exhibited on the same walls with those spuri- 
ous samples of adobe Renaissance. 

With the numerous churches summarily dismissed 
from consideration, the general aspects of Lima call 
for slight comment. The main plaza has the cathedral 
and Archbishop's house on one side, on another the 
palace of the Viceroys, painted a dull green, and arcades 
with small shops on the other two. In the centre there 
is a brisk fountain, surrounded by ill-kept flower-beds 
and ambitious statuary. The halls of the deputies and 
the senate are ancient structures of no architectural 
merit in the Plaza de la Independencia, where there is 
a really good work of art, an equestrian statue of 
Bolivar. In another and remote quarter of the city 
there is a handsome and tasteful monument of French 
design erected in honor of the successful defence of 
Callao against the Spaniards. Beyond the Rimac, with 
its three bridges, is the famous Alameda of statuary ; 
and not far away are the handsome Exhibition buildings 
of 1872, with the statue of Columbus, and the neglected 
botanical gardens. These are among the most ambitious 
of the architectural pretensions of a capital which was 
ravaged and plundered by the Chilians. There is one 
well-organized hospital and also a university. 

Lima is rich in historic traditions of the Incas and 



200 TROPICAL AMERICA 

Pizarro, and in reminiscences of former prosperity and 
greatness ; but it is poverty-stricken in appearance, 
and the population has fallen to 110,000. The streets are 
narrow, paved with cobblestones, and ill-lighted. In the 
olden time drainage was provided for by open conduits 
in the middle of the principal streets, and buzzards were 
the scavengers of the town. These trenches have been 
covered over and converted into sewer-pipes, emptying 
into the Rimac, which flows through the centre of the 
city with a swift current, when swollen with rains in the 
mountains. This is a marked sanitary improvement; 
but there are few other signs of progress. The rows 
of adobe houses and shops are low, dingy, and shabby. 
The most prominent feature of the domestic architec- 
ture is the irregular line of wooden boxes running across 
the fronts of the altos, or second stories, and projecting 
over the sidewalks. For four or five feet from the bot- 
tom these are completely inclosed, so that the occupants 
are screened from view from the street ; and above the 
balcony railing there are swinging glass doors or lattice- 
work shutters. These balconies offer facilities for out- 
door lounging at all seasons ; and during the carnival 
the water brigades are stationed in them, as well as on 
the flat roofs overhead. The facility with which the 
narrow streets are commanded from these covered 
ambuscades has undoubtedly encouraged the custom of 
showering water upon pedestrians and mule-riders. 

Nearly every house and shop has a flagstaff, from which 
streamers of bunting are displayed on national holidays, 
and banners and religious emblems on popular feast 
and saints' days, of which there is a full calendar. The 
ground floor of a house is ordinarily occupied by shops 
on each side of the arched entrance, which is barred 



LIMA IN CARNIVAL WEEK 201 

with double iron gates. Within is the passageway lead- 
ing to the central courtyard, the walls often being deco- 
rated with inferior paintings, either religious or classical 
in subject. A winding stairway conducts the visitor to 
the second floor, where there are large, airy apartments 
surrounding the interior court. Some of the best 
houses have only one floor, with high vaulted ceilings 
and double patios. The most pretentious mercantile 
offices are approached by archways leading through 
paved courts. The shops are small and make little 
display, many of them being hardly more than stalls. 
Some of the best patronized stores are narrow boxes 
under the covered paved walks of the arcades in the 
main plaza. 

The Spanish pioneers in Peru were mainly Castilians. 
This accounts not only for the beauty of the women, but 
also for the purity of the language spoken. The Span- 
ish heard in the best circles is in idiom and pronun- 
ciation the least corrupted in South America. The 
Castilian blood explains also that passion for excitement 
and that inherent love of pleasure which have always 
been marked characteristics of the Peruvian capital. 
Bull-fights have retained their popularity; but the 
exhibitions are not so coarse and barbarous as those in 
Montevideo. Horses are not gored and killed, the 
skill of the riders and the tormentors being shown in 
distracting the attention of the bull and preventing 
wanton and unnecessary bloodshed. The bull-ring is 
superior to the shabby enclosure in Montevideo, and is 
the largest in Spanish America. Cock-pits also flourish, 
but are no longer patronized by ladies of fashion as in 
the olden days. There are two theatres, but in these 
hard times their business is not remunerative. The 



202 TROPICAL AMERICA 

passion for gambling has somewhat abated, owing prob- 
ably to the lack of prosperity in the poverty-stricken 
capital ; but public lotteries conducted for religious or 
benevolent objects still flourish, the streets being filled 
day and night with starveling boys, who have tickets to 
hawk with creaking voices and shrill outcries. In for- 
mer days religious feasts, like St. John's Day, with 
open-air festivities in the valley of the Amancaes, were 
converted into a saturnalia of dissipation, indecent danc- 
ing, and riotous romping for the recreation of the lower 
classes ; but there has been a marked improvement in 
public morals and in popular amusements. The carni- 
val scenes now represent the extremity to which ex- 
cesses are carried by this pleasure-loving population. 

Lima is one of the pleasantest cities south of the 
Isthmus as a place of permanent residence for foreigners. 
One's earliest impressions of it are invariably disap- 
pointing ; but that is because imagination, inspired by 
tales of the Incas and the Spanish conquest, has drawn 
too large drafts upon credulity. A day or two is 
required for discounting these credits, and readjusting 
one's ideas to current conditions. Then Lima is found 
to be a city with many attractions. The weather is 
sultry, but the heat is not inclement ; and the climate 
the year round is equable, albeit slightly enervating 
from the lack of anything resembling winter. One soon 
comes to have a real affection for the bright plaza, with 
its portales and Moorish effects ; and the foreign society 
one finds is delightful. It may be that my own im- 
pressions were too strongly colored by exceptionally 
favorable surroundings, for the American Minister, the 
Hon. John Hicks, and the Secretary of Legation, 
Richard Renshaw Neill, were most indefatigable in 



LIMA IN CARNIVAL WEEK 203 

promoting my pleasure and comfort, and in introducing 
me to people whom I was most anxious to meet. If 
Lima receives a visitor in carnival week with a dash 
of cold water, it speedily overwhelms him with gentle 
courtesies and completely wins his heart. - 

Past and present jostle each other at every turn in 
the Peruvian capital. One starts out for a morning 
stroll, and is nearly run off his feet by a drove of 
donkeys loaded with the newest English and German 
calicoes for the interior, and the next moment he sees a 
swarthy Indian milk-vender, with black hair braided 
behind her back in two long plaits, who looks like a 
daughter of the Incas. He may halt at one end of the 
plaza to buy a morning journal, with a few meagre 
dispatches and a translation of a French romance, or he 
may cross over to the cathedral, fee a guide and be 
taken below to the dark corner where Pizarro's bones 
are reputed to have been buried. He may go on to the 
central market, which he will find to be a modern bazaar 
of European wares, as well as a base of supplies for the 
Lima households, and a short turn of three blocks will 
bring him to the ancient Plaza of the Inquisition, and 
the hall where death decrees were signed by fanatical 
judges for the burning of heretics. He may take a 
new-fangled ice at a gilded French restaurant, and then 
stop at a silversmith's stall and drive a bargain for a 
battered idol buried in one of the aboriginal cemeteries 
centuries before Pizarro crossed the seas on his errand 
of conquest. There is the garish daylight of industrial 
occupation and pleasurable excitement, and there is 
the moonlight of historic reminiscence shining with 
reflected lustre over this fabled city of the kings. The 
clangor of bells in mediaeval church-towers summons 



204 TROPICAL AMERICA 

a motley population at dawn to another brief term of 
labor ; but there is a melancholy cadence which seems to 
tell of bygone glory, deeds of darkness and shame, and 
disastrous wars of conquest. There is no other South 
American town where the spirit of the past colors so 
strongly the life of the present. 

It is the afternoon hour for the bathing trains. Surely 
there will be nothing in the ride to Chorillos to divert 
one's thoughts from the Lima of to-day! There are 
nine or ten cars filled with men, women, and children, 
who are going for a dip in the sea. On the American 
and English railways there are similar trains with 
thi'ongs destined for the surf baths at Callao and the 
Point. Sea-bathing is the fashionable medical prescrip- 
tion for every ill to which flesh is heir. A theory has 
been started that it is necessary to take these baths in 
order to sustain bodily vigor. Not that there is aught 
amiss with the climate. Lima in that respect is as 
highly favored as Eden, as every Peruvian enthusiast 
will tell you; but even Adam and Eve, they will add, 
must have found perpetual summer and a rainless 
Paradise slightly debilitating. There is no winter in 
Peru and something is needed as a substitute for tonic 
effect upon the human system. Surf-bathing, according 
to the fashionable medical theory, is a mild touch of 
winter, and it promotes physical reaction. It accom- 
plishes in the course of a year what is effected by 
alternating changes of season in higher latitudes. It 
serves to protect the lotos-eaters of Lima from the 
enervating influences of a perfect climate. Certainly it 
is a touch of winter. The Humboldt current coming 
from the Antarctic lowers the temperature of the surf 
alonsf the rainless coast. The water at Callao and 



LIMA IN CARNIVAL WEEK 205 

Chorillos, in the warmest weather, is colder than the 
surf at Coney Island in October. It is a plunge, not 
into tepid, but into downright cold water, which is 
taken as a substitute for winter. Some physicians have 
gone so far as to recommend two surf-baths a day for 
patients suffering from languor induced by the de- 
lightful conditions of existence at Lima. Fashion has 
sanctioned the practice of frequent surf-bathing. The 
trains are filled every afternoon with the wealth and 
fashion of Lima. 

But what station is this at which the train draws up 
in its progress seaward? It is Miraflores, the scene of 
the last stand made by the Peruvian army in defence of 
Lima. Before the war it was one of the most beautiful 
suburbs, where wealthy merchants owned fine country 
estates. After the battle it was pillaged and burned, 
and from the desolation and ruin wrought on that 
fateful day it has never recovered. It was on the hill- 
sides above the station that the campaign, fought for 
the possession of the nitrate and guano beds of the 
coast, was brought to an end. The Chilians, acquiring 
complete command of the sea after the capture of the 
Huascar, had sent an army of 25,000 men to Pisco 
after the conquest of Tarapac^ and Tacna. Only an 
inferior force of disheartened Peruvians could be rallied 
against them. After Miraflores, Lima was at the mercy 
of the invaders, and was only saved from destruction 
like a brand out of the burning, by the determined 
efforts of the foreign residents. 

This, too, is Chorillos, once an obscure fishing village, 
with singularly bold and varied coast scenery, and after- 
ward the favorite watering-place of Lima, where the 
wealthiest families passed the summers, and where fort- 



206 TROPICAL AMERICA 

unes were won and lost by gaining. The hardest fight- 
ing of the fierce battle which decided the fate of the 
capital was on the crest of the morro overlooking the 
bathing houses. The Chilians, advancing upon Lima 
and storming a long line of defensive works, had been 
held at bay for a few hours, and then were left in pos- 
session of the field. Chorillos, with its seaside hotels 
and summer cottages, was plundered and burned to 
the ground. At least six thousand Peruvian soldiers 
were killed on these two battle-fields, and about thirteen 
hundred Chilians. It is within a short distance of this 
battleground, where kinsmen and friends fought for the 
defence of Lima and were shot down and massacred, 
.that crowd of bathers now disport themselves morning 
and afternoon. Chorillos has been partly rebuilt, but it 
has not regained its former prestige as the most fash- 
ionable pleasure resort of the West Coast. The charred 
ruins have disappeared, but its prosperity has not been 
restored. The misfortunes of Peru culminated in those 
two crushing defeats at Chorillos and Miraflores. It 
was the second invasion of a country inhabited by a 
people naturally industrious and peaCeable. It was as 
disastrous in its results as Pizarro's campaign against 
the subject races of the Incas. 

Ten miles south of Chorillos are the ruins of an older 
civilization than Pizarro's, — the work of the same won- 
derful builders whose aqueducts, roads, villages, and 
temples are found throughout Peru. The Temple of 
Pachacamac, in the Lurin Valley, is now hardly dis- 
tinguishable from the tussocks of sand which are found 
everywhere along the rainless coast. Twenty yeai-s 
ago it was possible to trace the outlines of the palace, 
the Temple of the Sun, public squares, broad avenues, 



LIMA IN CARNIVAL WEEK 207 

and the foundations of ancient houses, and also to ex- 
plore the tombs of princes and people. The sepulchres 
have been opened and plundered, the yellow sand has 
accumulated on the bleak hillside, and the extensive 
remains of the aboriginal city, with its terraces, are now 
almost buried out of sight and remembrance. Like the 
mounds near Truxillo, this temple represents the indus- 
try of a primitive coast race which was conquered by 
the Incas at least a century before the appearance of 
Pizarro. The Chilian armies, in their march from 
Lurin to Chorillos, passed the ruins of cities built 
both by the conquered coast nation and by the vic- 
torious Incas ; they followed in the track of Pizarro ; 
and they left behind them blackened heaps where had 
stood the coast resorts and suburbs of Lima. So his- 
tory has repeated itself in the wonderful Valley of the 
Rimac. 

The Chilians, with a stronger infusion of Spanish 
blood, conquered the descendants of the Incas whose 
power was overthrown by Pizarro. It was an invasion 
as calamitous for Peru as that earlier campaign of 
conquest. For nine years there were dictatorships in- 
volving civil war. The future of the country seemed 
hopeless until under President Caceres's administration 
the compromise with the bondholders was effected, and 
there was a marked improvement in public affairs. 
His term was about to expire when I visited Peru, 
and the succession was a matter of grave uncertainty. 
There had been four candidates in the field ; but Colonel 
Morales Bermudez was understood to be the favored 
candidate of the Government, and he was successful in 
April, 1890. The elections in Peru are generally car- 
ried by the party which obtains possession of the ballot- 



208 TROPICAL AMERICA 

boxes, and in a struggle of this nature the government 
of the day exercises overwhelming influence. The Indi- 
ans in the interior have little to do with determining the 
political fortunes of the country, although they consti- 
tute the mass of the population. They have been help- 
less victims either of wars of conquest like Pizarro's and 
the Chilian campaign, or of political strife by which the 
rule of military adventurers has been established, or of 
financial compromises by which foreign investors have 
foreclosed their mortgages upon the resoui'ces of the 
nation. 



XI 

GUAYAQUIL AND THE ISTHMUS 

VOYAGE FROM CALLAO TO PANAMA — ECUADOR'S BUST 

PORT — THE ISTHMUS CAPITAL WATER AFTER COGNAC 

AND CHAMPAGNE CONFLICTING VIEWS OF THE FRENCH 

CANAL EXTENSION OF THE CONCESSIONS — PROBABLE 

ACTION OF THE COLOMBIAN GOVERNMENT 

No voyage could have been more delightful than the 
run from Callao to Panama with Captain Hullah in 
the steamer Ooquimbo. The Secretary of the American 
Legation and the acting American Consul accompanied 
me to the steamer, and introduced me to several fellow- 
passengers from Lima, so that before the ship sailed I 
was surrounded with acquaintances. Captain Hullah 
was unceasing in promoting the pleasure of the passen- 
gers, and good fellowship reigned during the voyage of 
eight days. The heat was not unpleasantly felt, although 
we crossed the equator with a nearly vertical sun 
toward the end of February. The sea was smooth, 
except in open roadsteads where the ship was rocked 
by a heavy swell. A fresh breeze invariably had a cool 
breath. Sunsets of pale shades of yellow, pink, and 
saffron revealed new beauties every night. It was an 
almost ideal voyage in southern waters. 

A hundred miles north of the desert levels of Payta 
the rainless zone comes abruptly to an end. At Tum- 
bez there is a sudden transition from sandy barren, and 

209 



210 TROPICAL AMERICA 

bare cliffs to heavily wooded shores, and the freshest 
and rankest vegetation. At the Gulf of Guayaquil the 
rainless coast is no longer seen. A rainy zone is entered 
with vistas of equatorial woods and luxuriant foliage. 
The scientific reasons advanced in explanation of this 
sudden change are more numerous than satisfactory. 
Many of the theories based upon prevailing winds and 
ocean currents are flatly contradicted by the logbooks 
of experienced sea captains navigating these waters. 
It would be difficult to find a more interesting field for 
physical investigation than the West Coast of South 
America, with its 2000 miles of barren cliffs, and its 
sudden and amazing contrasts of vegetation in the Gulf 
of Guayaquil. 

Guayaquil is practically the only port of a country 
equalling in territorial extent the New England and 
Middle States, with Maryland, Ohio, and Indiana added. 
It is the collecting point for the produce of this wide 
district, and the base of its foreign supplies. Situated 
thirty miles from the entrance to the Gulf, it has a good 
harbor accessible under favorable conditions of the tides 
to vessels of heavy draught. Several inland rivers are 
navigable beyond it, and the mule-roads lead from it to 
Quito, the low-lying coast lands and the forest belt of 
the Montana. With all the disadvantages of an ener- 
vating climate, and of the reactionary tendencies of the 
least progressive and most priest-ridden government on 
the Southei'n Continent, it has surpassed Callao in 
population, having now about 35,000 inhabitants. The 
volume of its commerce is slowly but steadily increasing, 
as it is the only distributing point for the exports and 
imports of Ecuador. For a mile along the water front 
there are warehouses and shops, and there is a brisk 



GUAYAQUIL AND THE ISTHMUS 211 

movement in the streets. The town itself, with its 
quaint double-towered churches, and its weather-beaten 
houses with bamboo framing coated with mud and plas- 
ter, is not impressive ; but its inland and foreign trade, 
capable of rapid development after the opening of rail- 
way communication with Quito, entitles it to serious 
consideration among Spanish-American cities. The 
United States has about one-fifth of the total volume of 
trade, its exports and imports being nearly equal. With 
English, French, and German merchants, competing 
actively for the trade, and with American shipping 
seldom seen in the Gulf of Guayaquil, this result can 
only be explained in one way. There has been an 
American mercantile house on the ground since 1869, 
and it has displayed commendable enterprise in intro- 
ducing manufactures and products from the United 
States. This house has identified itself with the mate- 
rial interests of the country, and has been successful in 
extending American trade. 

From Cape St. Helena, the northern headland of the 
Gulf of Guayaquil, and Cape St. Francisco near the 
equator, the coast makes a long easterly detour curv- 
ing backward toward the 80 th meridian at Panama. 
The West Coast steamers would lengthen their routes 
more than one-third, if they followed the shore and called 
at the Colombian ports. For this reason, and also be- 
cause the intermediate ports are insignificant, they make 
no stops between Guayaquil and the Isthmus. Two 
great gulfs are formed by the arch of the Isthmus ; the 
Bay of Panama which is at least 120 marine miles broad 
at its mouth, and the Gulf of Darien which measures 
over 200 miles in width from Point San Bias to Carta- 
gena. With 1000 miles of seaboard, 600 on the Pacific 



212 TROPICAL AMERICA 

and 400 on the Caribbean, Colombia has practically only 
the two Isthmus ports, Panama and Colon, and the two 
keys of the Magdalena Valley, Cartagena and Barran- 
quilla. 

The picturesque old town of Panama has so foul a 
reputation as one of the worst plague spots of the tropics, 
that wary travellers double their doses of quinine forty- 
eight hours out at sea, and anxiously number the hours 
while they are in port. So strong is the prejudice 
against it, that the scenic beauty of the harbor escapes 
observation, and the quaint buildings, the charming 
drives through the suburbs, and the fine prospects to be 
had from the Battery, are not appreciated. At the risk 
of being considered an optimist I must deliberately re- 
cord my testimony to the effect that a week may be 
pleasfintly passed on the Isthmus. Panama may have 
been a pandemonium during the canal revels; but it is 
now a reputable town where one may remain with 
security, and form friendships which will be the treasure- 
trove of a protracted foreign journey. The ruins of the 
old city founded after Balboa's fii'st glimpse of the 
Pacific, and established as the stronghold of Spanish 
power, from which Peru was conquered and Central 
America overrun, lie five miles to the south buried under 
the tropical growth and decay of two centuries. The 
only landmark of this famous town which can be seen 
from the harbor is the crumbling tower of the church 
where Pizarro offered his pra3^ers and vows to the Vir- 
gin before sailing southward for the conquest of Peru. 
Morgan, the boldest of the buccaneers, sacked and de- 
stroyed the old city with its Moorish churches adorned 
with gold and pearls, and its luxurious vice-regal court. 
Panama as it is known to-day was rebuilt, in 1673, with 



GUAYAQUIL AND THE ISTHMUS 213 

Indian labor and the best Spanish engineering science 
and artistic taste. How well the work was done the 
fragments of the military walls and the massive foun- 
dations of masonry at the Battery disclose. How true 
was the artistic instinct is shown by the oldest of the 
churches which are genuine samples of characteristic 
Moorish architecture unaffected by a spurious and de- 
based Renaissance, with which Spanish-American cities 
are ordinarily encumbered. 

Panama as the key of the rock-ribbed Isthmus uniting 
two continents has felt the impress of four mighty races 
in the triumphs and vicissitudes of its career. Spain 
converted it into the military centre of a vast realm of 
conquest. The buccaneers raided and plundered it in 
founding the English colonial empire and challenging 
Spanish ascendency in the New World. The Americans 
built the Panama Railway through fathomless swamps 
and pestilential forests, to revive its fortunes and to 
establish short lines of communication for the commerce 
of the world. At last came the French fresh from con- 
quests over Nature at Suez to fire the ambitions of the 
historic town, to debauch its morals, and to leave in the 
unfinished ditch the most startling memorial of human 
miscalculation and credulity that modern civilization 
has known. The collapse of M. de Lesseps's project has 
been so dire a catastrophe, both for the Isthmus and for 
French investors, that the incoming traveller can have 
eyes and ears for nothing else. 

Water is a- wholesome but insipid drink after a 
riotous excess of cognac and champagne. Panama dur- 
ing the period of the French occupation enjoyed all 
the excitement of a prolonged debauch. Before M. de 
■Lesseps's arrival on the Isthmus in January, 1880, it 



214 TROPICAL AMERICA 

was a drowsy town, which the transit trade had failed 
to enrich. In the course of twelve months rents of 
buildings were quadrupled, the prices of land within a 
few blocks of the handsome little plaza were more 
than doubled, and the most sober-minded residents 
were seized with a mania for speculation. French con- 
tractors came in, with adventurers, profligates, and 
gamblers close behind them. For nine years there 
were high prices, feverish excitement, business activity, 
hard drinking, and general demoralization. Champagne 
flowed and diamonds flashed. Improvidence in canal 
management was matched by reckless play in the gam- 
bling hells. Corruption, bribery, and immorality were 
rampant. The moral sense of the staid old town was 
perverted long before the collapse of the canal enter- 
prise. The mercenary contractors, the tainted adven- 
turers, the diamond merchants, the gamblers and the 
rakes retired from the Isthmus when their occupation 
had gone. Panama awoke from its debauch in 1889 
to live on water in place of cognac. Rents and real 
estate values went down with a rush ; trade declined ; 
the throngs of loungers in the great tap-room opposite 
the cathedral thinned out ; diamonds disappeared from 
the streets ; life became painfully quiet and uneventful. 
The times were dull, and Panama craved the stimu- 
lative effects of the old excitement, profligacy, and 
riotous living. It demanded, with passionate intensity 
of feeling, the completion of the Panama Canal. It 
was a matter of public indifference whether the work 
were done by the French, the English, or the Americans, 
so long as it were undertaken by some well-equipped 
body of capitalists for the revival of the business of 
the town, and, incidentall}^ for the welfare of the 
maritime world. 



GUAYAQUIL AND THE ISTHMUS 215 

Panama was awaiting when I visited it, in March, 
1890, the report of the canal commission from Paris, 
with the forced cheerfulness and the suppressed excite- 
ment of an unlucky gambler, watching the turn of 
the cards that will determine the fate of his last gold 
piece. M. Brunet, liquidator of the company, in order 
to inspire public confidence in the mismanaged and 
collapsed enterprise, appointed an international commis- 
sion of experts, and empowered it to make an ex- 
haustive investigation of the accounts of the con- 
tractors, and of the plans and estimates of the 
engineers, and to decide whether the completion of 
the canal was practical. This commission dispatched to 
the Isthmus a delegation of five experts. The delega- 
tion spent five weeks on the Isthmus, inspected all the 
material and machinery, made a minute and thorough 
examination of every section of the proposed water- 
way, and critically studied the estimates, working plans, 
and revised calculations of the engineers. They were 
discreet men, for they left the Isthmus without impart- 
ing to any one the slightest hint respecting their im- 
pressions and conclusions. 

I found at Panama pessimists who could see naught 
but evil, folly, and calamity, in the canal enterprise, and 
also optimists who had the faith required for moving 
the Culebra Mountain, and restoring the flow of finan- 
cial investments into this famous ditch. The opti- 
mists were in majority ; but the minority were exceed- 
ingly acrid in their criticism of canal management. 
I felt at once the movement of these hostile forces. 
In the morning the canal was painted black for me, and 
in the afternoon a vivid scarlet, and in the watches of 
the night, as I listened to the nerve-rending clangor 



216 TROPICAL AMERICA 

of the cathedral bell, or the ceaseless clicking of 
glasses in the bar-room of the Grand Hotel, I was too 
bewildered to discriminate between these violent con- 
trasts of color. A week's stay in the Isthmus con- 
vinced me that the truth lay somewhere between the 
extreme views which were held by the enemies and 
the partisans of the canal. That the management of 
the enterprise in all the stages of active construction 
was incapable, reckless, wasteful, corrupt, and scan- 
dalous was not seriously disputed. This was one of 
the few points of agreement between opponents and 
advocates of the canal. Sharp lines of divergence 
opened at nearly all other points. The condition of 
the canal property was represented, on the one hand, 
as incredibly bad, and on the other as phenomenally 
good. The houses and store-sheds along the line were 
described as rotting from unceasing dampness ; the 
material and machinery as corroding with rust and 
rendered practically worthless ; the rolling stock and 
tracks as valueless for future operations ; the costly 
dredges as water-logged and irretrievably ruined; and 
the bed of the canal as rapidly filling up with sand at 
the Atlantic and Pacific mouths, and as littered with a 
rank growth of tropical vegetation in the intermediate 
spaces. On the other hand, the engineers asserted that 
all the machinery, material, and property was in better 
condition than it was when work was* suspended in 
1889, and that at a signal from Paris the houses could 
at once be filled with workmen, trains of earth-cars set 
in motion on the construction tracks, and a dozen 
dredges put in operation within a week. 

The Chief Engineer of the Panama section, a brother 
of the acting Director, accompanied me to the Boca, 



GtrAYAQUlL AN!) THE ISTHMUS 217 

and conveyed me in a steam launch through the com- 
pleted section of the canal and the Rio Grande as far 
as the innermost dredges. Under his guidance I was 
enabled not only to see the Panama section of the 
canal, where there was a depth of eleven metres at 
high, and seven at low water — a depth which could 
readily be increased two metres by dredging — but also 
to inspect the numerous craft, dredges, machines, store- 
houses, and buildings of the Company. Everything 
which fell under my eyes was in excellent order and 
had been freshly painted. Subsequent observations 
along the line of the railway and at Colon convinced 
me that while there was necessarily some degree of 
deterioration from disuse and excessive dampness, the 
Company's movable property was in a fair state of 
preservation. Why should it not be well cared for? 
There was a large staff of officials at the Isthmus who 
had nothing to do except to look after the material and 
machinery. The Company was nominally bankrupt; 
but its cashier drew regularly upon Paris for 160,000 a 
month, and paid out that amount in salaries and for 
general expenses. Paint was cheap and it was not 
spared. Every mile of the canal line was under sur- 
veillance, and the property was in as good condition as 
the circumstances warranted. Nevertheless it was grad- 
ually deteriorating, and from every year of disuse was 
losing some part of its original value. 

Respecting the practicability of the completion of the 
canal, I found the widest possible lines of divergence 
between the opinions of the pessimists and the opti- 
mists. M. Berges, the acting Director, assured me 
that there were on the Isthmus no engineering difficul- 
ties which could not be readily overcome ; that the 



218 TROPICAL AMERICA 

freshets of the Chagres had caused less trouble than 
was anticipated and could be easily controlled ; that 
while the engineers were not wholly in accord respect- 
ing details, there was a substantial agreement on the 
expediency of substituting locks for the original tide- 
level canal ; and that the completion of the work was en- 
tirely practicable, and could not, in his judgment, involve 
a larger expenditure than 1100,000,000. M. Berges's 
brother, one of the principal engineers, told me that the 
mechanical difficulties were not so serious as they had 
been generally regarded, and that the canal could 
certainly be finished if the requisite capital were pro- 
vided ; but not, he thought, for $100,000,000. Compe- 
tent engineers, on the other hand, who were not in 
the interest of the Company, had stated that at least 
1300,000,000 would be required in order to open the 
canal for inter-oceanic traffic. That estimate would 
increase the nominal cost of the work to 1800,000,000, 
the bonds issued having had a face value of $500,000,000, 
although $265,000,000 probably represented the actual 
amount of money sunk in the canal. The pessimists 
asserted that not more than $80,000,000 of honest work 
was ever done on the canal, $185,000,000 having been 
squandered and flung away, the larger part of it in 
France, without its reaching the Isthmus at all. Here 
they proved too much for their case ; for if only 
$80,000,000 had been expended on the canal, the cost 
of finishing it would not be $300,000,000, as they repre- 
sented, but a much lower limit. This, however, they 
would not admit, but producing section maps of the 
Isthmus, pointed out that the mountain barriers had 
only been scratched, and that with such meagre results 
to show for vast expenditures, the whole scheme was to 



GUAYAQUIL AND THE ISTHMUS 219 

be condemned as impracticable and visionary. One 
cause of the variation in the estimates, it must be 
added, was the lack of a common basis of calculation. 
The French engineers were basing their figures upon a 
canal with locks and an artificial lake somewhere in the 
centre. The critics were calculating the cost of a much 
more expensive work. 

A year afterward I returned to Panama to find the 
French Canal enterprise in a comatose state having the 
semblance of death. Its friends asserted that it was 
sleeping ; its enemies said that it was dead. There had 
been diplomatic incantations and jugglery during the 
intervening year ; but there were no signs of returning 
animation. Life could only come from contact with 
life. Money was the life of the enterprise when the 
Isthmus was converted into a hot-bed of speculative 
activity and reckless expenditure. Before there could 
be stir and movement among the dry bones of M. de 
Lesseps's grand project, the vivifying impulses of fresh 
masses of capital must be felt. Not one encouraging 
word had been received from Paris since Lieutenant 
Wyse's departure from Bogota and the Isthmus to indi- 
cate that the money required for the completion of the 
canal could be secured. Apparently French faith in 
the enterprise had been exhausted. 

During the spring of 1890 it seemed probable that 
the Colombian Government would allow the original 
contract to expire by its own limitations, and would 
thereby become the residuary legatee of the entire work. 
This was undoubtedly the secret policy of President 
Nunez. While the executive power was authorized to 
grant an extension of time for the completion of the 
canal, it could not be compelled to do so. The Com- 



220 TROPICAL AMERICA 

pany had been organized March 3d, 1880, and under 
the conditions of the contract it was to construct and 
open the canal during the period ending March 3d, 
1892. By availing itself of its rights under the contract 
the Colombian Government could have established its 
absolute ownership of the unfinished enterprise. By 
declining to extend the construction period it would 
have succeeded to all the rights of the bankrupt Com- 
pany. It would have secured possession of all the 
lands, buildings, and everything except the movable 
property of the Company ; and it would also have estab- 
lished its ownership of the completed fraction of the 
work, variously estimated at one-third, one-fifth, or one- 
tenth of the whole undertaking. President Nuiiez, it 
was then currently believed, favored this policy on the 
ground that the Government could make more money 
out of the enterprise by taking possession of the unfin- 
ished canal, and disposing of its rights to a new Com- 
pany, than by extending the term and allowing the 
assignees of the French Company to proceed with the 
work. It was evident, however, that the Company 
would appeal to the courts, and not surrender control 
over the property until every legal expedient had been 
exhausted. In this struggle, moreover, it would enlist 
the sympathies of the population of the Isthmus and of 
adjoining States, and the Government would have to 
face the risks of revolutionary outbreaks. 

This was the situation when Lieutenant Wyse subse- 
quently arrived at Panama to negotiate an extension of 
the period allowed for construction. He was in a dis- 
putatious mood and committed many tactical blunders ; 
and when he went to Bogota he was drawn into several 
unnecessary controversies, and his mission seemed to be 



GITAYAQUIL AND THE ISTHMUS 221 

destined to failure. The intervention of the Bishop of 
Panama and the clerical party rescued him from defeat. 
A most influential deputation, headed by the Bishop, 
visited President Nunez at Cartagena and pleaded for 
the extension of the construction privileges. The coast 
district, which had supplied cattle for the canal labor- 
ers, also lifted up its voice in support of the French 
Company's appeal. Dr. Nunez ascertained that public 
opinion in Panama and the four adjacent States was 
setting strongly in favor of a renewal of the Company's 
privileges. The Bishop of Panama convinced him that 
it would be hazardous for him to reject the appeal of 
the Isthmus. He decided to reverse his policy and to 
revise the contract with the French Company. The 
deputies of the National Congress, who had previously 
been instructed to vote against the extension of con- 
struction privileges, were informed of the President's 
change of base, and, after a little diplomatic by-play, 
the new canal agreement was negotiated. Lieutenant 
Wyse returned in triumph to Panama and was the hero 
of the town. 

The agreement, while it conceded an extension of 
time for the completion of the canal, was a very shrewd 
bargain on the part of Colombia. The main point 
which Dr. Nunez was determined to secure was the 
avoidance of legal controversy whenever the time 
should come for the establishment of the Government's 
ownership of the work. An extension of ten years 
was granted, subject to the condition that a new com- 
pany should be organized not later than February 28th, 
1893, with sufficient capital to resume work " in a 
serious and regular manner." If work were not begun 
within the term agreed upon the contract would be 



222 TEOPICAL AMERICA 

void, and the Republic would enter into full possession 
and ownership of the work, plant, and property without 
the necessity of judicial proceedings, and without the 
payment of any indemnity for the canal. The contract 
would be invalidated on the same terms before Feb- 
ruary 28th, 1893, if the liquidator should cease to pro- 
tect the works, materials, and buildings, or if the corps 
of employes were withdrawn, or the money required 
for monthly disbursements withheld. It was stipulated 
that the buildings, materials, works, and improvements 
should be delivered in good condition to the Govern- 
ment, if work on the canal were not resumed with 
adequate capital within two years. By these specifica- 
tions the ground was cleared for the transfer of the 
property to Colombia without litigation and without 
indemnity, if the French company should be unable to 
raise additional capital and to resume work on the 
canal before February 28th, 1893. All complications 
with the French Government would be avoided, and 
President Nunez would be enabled to open negotiations 
with an American or an English syndicate for the com- 
pletion of the canal on the basis of the payment of the 
Colombian national debt. The government mortgage 
on the property would be virtually based upon a quit- 
claim deed signed by Lieutenant Wyse as the agent of 
the liquidator of the bankrupt companj^ Instead of 
taking possession of the work on INIarch 3d, 1892, with 
litigation in the courts and revolution in the air, the 
President agreed to wait another year in order to 
acquire absolute ownership of the canal property with- 
out legal controversy and without political resistance. 

The Panama Canal will ultimately be in the market 
and will be open for competitive bids from London, 



GUAYAQtJIL AND THE ISTHMUS 223 

New York, and Berlin, if the French company fail to 
raise $100,000,000 for the prosecution of the work. 
That is a comprehensive statement of the situation. 
If the French Company can be reorganized the Colom- 
bian Government by the new agreement obtains satis- 
factory guarantees for the maintenance of an adequate 
garrison along the line of the canal, and for ample 
pecuniary compensations for its services in obtaining 
the expropriation of lands, buildings,- and plantations 
required for the work. The Government has made a 
hard bargain with the bankrupt company, and its inter- 
ests are protected whether the final desperate effort to 
revive the project under the existing management be 
successful or otherwise. The question of finishing the 
canal rests with French investors. With 1265,000,000 
in hard cash sunk in this famous ditch, they can hardly 
have the heart to pledge themselves to raise $100,000,000 
more without having definite assurance that when that 
amount has been expended another $50,000,000 or $100,- 
000,000 will not be required for the completion of the 
work. 



XII 
CARTAGENA AND CARACAS 

THE CHIEF FORTRESS OF THE SPANISH MAIS HOME OF 

PRESIDENT NUNEZ THE COLOMBIAN TRAVESTY OF RE- 
PUBLICAN GOVERNMENT VENEZUELAN COAST TOWNS 

AMERICAN COMMERCIAL ENTERPRISE BIRTHPLACE OF 

BOLIVAR REVOLT AGAINST GUZMAN BLANCO A PRESI- 
DENTIAL INAUGURATION AT CARACAS 

As Panama was the stronghold of the Conquistadores 
on the Pacific, and the common base of operations for 
the conquest of Peru and the settlement of Central 
America, so Cartagena was the main fortress of the 
Spanish Main. The harbor is a capacious one, but is 
approached by a narrow and circuitous passage, the 
main entrance having been obstructed many years ago 
in defensive operations against an English fleet. The 
steamer in entering the harbor passed between a crumb- 
ling battery on shore and a bristling little fort on an 
island. A broad lagoon commanded by a series of land 
batteries opened before the eye, and in the distance lay 
the walled town from which old Spain received the 
proudest of its fleets of galleons, and upon which it 
expended 150,000,000 of treasure in the attempt to 
render it an impregnable fortress. The old city was 
built upon an island, and surrounded with ramparts of 
masonry from forty to fifty feet in thickness. These 
massive fortifications were pierced with embrasures for 
224 



CARTAGENA AND CARACAS 225 

guns and with stone turrets for sentinels at regular 
intervals. Probably these defences were never as 
formidable as they looked, for the buccaneers were not 
afraid to run into the harbor, and the French and 
English carried the town by storm on the only occasions 
when it was regularly besieged. Cartagena remains, 
however, almost the only memorial in the New World 
of the military science of the Spanish era of conquest. 
Its ramparts were built for all time. Few cities in 
Tropical America have retained the antique character- 
istics of the Spanish conquest. Rio de Janeiro has its 
musty churches, Cordova is the most mediaeval town 
in the Plate countries, and Lima and Panama have the 
oldest architecture on the West Coast; but each has 
been modernized, and has renewed its youth in florid 
French buildings, and the glare of electric light. Car- 
tagena remains what it has always been, — an antique 
fortress. Two hills, Popa and San Felipe, tower above 
it with fortifications and churches. A shallow canal 
connects it with the Magdalena. The city is filled with 
old churches and musty ruins, is ill-paved, neglected, 
and unimproved; but it is one of the most picturesque 
towns in Spanish America. 

Cartagena is virtually the centre of political power in 
Colombia, for it is the residence of President Nunez, a 
dictator without the name. Before the revolution of 
1885, during which Colon was burned and the Panama 
Railway protected by American marines, the States 
enjoyed a large measure of home rule. The insurgents 
who were defeated in that struggle were Radicals and ad- 
vanced Liberals. They were making a stand against cen- 
tralized government, and they were overthrown. When 
the followers of Dr. Nunez were victorious, they trans- 



226 TROPICAL AMERICA 

formed the constitutional system of the country. States 
which had formerly elected their own presidents, or 
governors, were reduced to the level of departments and 
ruled by partisans sent out from Bogota. Under the Rio 
Negro Constitution of 1863, each State had been allowed 
to organize and equip its own military forces. Under the 
Constitution of 1886 this privilege was revoked, and the 
supremacy of the national government was established 
with the aid of a standing army under its own control. 
The Liberals who had triumphed under the leadership 
of Mosquera had established religious liberty and 
ordered confiscations of ecclesiastical property. The 
Conservatives who were victorious in 1885, restored 
many of these churches, and voted a large compensation 
fund for property which had been sold. The Liberal 
marriage laws were revised. The schools were brought 
under the influence of the clergy and many reactionary 
measures were enacted. Dr. Nunez, who had entered 
public life as a Radical agitator, swung completely 
around the circle. As the leader of the National party 
he became the ally of Clericalism, and the defender of 
ecclesiastical privilege. Being a man of unrivalled 
capacity for directing public affairs and enforcing party 
discipline, he has established a highly centralized mili- 
tary government without incurring unpopularity by 
remaining constantly in sight and openly exercising 
authority. He has been successful in maintaining 
peace, in repressing revolutionary tendencies, and in 
introducing financial reforms and public works. Strong 
government has not been without its advantages ; but 
the system can hardly be considered either republican 
or democratic. 

When I returned to the Isthmus in 1891, the farce of 



CARTAGENA AND CARACAS 227 

electing a President by popular vote was in course of 
preparation. Dr. Nunez was the candidate of two 
factions of the Conservative party, each of whom had 
its own leader in training for the vice-Presidency. One 
of them was Dr. Caro, who had been the author of the 
Constitution of 1886. The other was General Velez, a 
brave soldier and successful department administrator. 
Dr. Nunez proclaimed his neutrality in this contest for 
several months ; but finally withdrew his support from 
the Velez faction, making Dr. Caro the official candidate 
for vice-President. The Velez committee at once 
nominated their leader for the Presidency against Dr. 
Nunez, and brought another candidate into the field for 
the vice-Presidency. If the elections on December 5th, 
1891, had been free, General Velez would have been 
elected with the aid of the Liberals ; but the superior 
resources of the government secured the reelection of 
President Nunez. 

Of all the travesties of popular government which 
have been witnessed in Spanish America, the political 
play enacted in Bogotd, and Cartagena is the most 
grotesque. Dr. Nunez is known as the titular President 
of the Republic. His practice is .to go to the capital at 
the beginning of the presidential term, and when he has 
taken the oath of office to remain there for a few weeks 
until all matters of policy and discipline are arranged 
among his followers. He then retires to his country- 
seat in Cartagena, leaving the vice-President to bear the 
burdens of state. The more servile the follower whom 
he places in that office the greater will be the titular 
President's feeling of security in enjoying the retire- 
ment of his home. A vice-President with policies and 
ambitions of his own will inevitably revolt against the 



228 TKOPICAL AMERICA 

dictatorship. President Nunez is very careful to select 
a candidate upon whose fidelity and humility he can 
depend. So absolute is government control over elec- 
tions that the official candidate is ahvays elected, or at 
least counted in. The vice-President is the industrious 
public functionary, who receives deputations, makes 
compromises with political factions, and directs the 
business of the State. Relieved of all official drudgery 
the President exercises supreme power without emerging 
from retirement. Dr. Nuiiez has mastered the art of 
governing a nation with luxurious ease. 

The Spanish Main opening eastward from Cartagena 
and the Magdalena ports is a grand mountainous coast. 
The maritime range is virtually a continuation of the 
Andean system, with a change of axis from North and 
South to West and East. As Santa Marta is passed 
the glittering peaks of the majestic Sierra Nevada are 
seen a long way inland. Here was once a strongly for- 
tified centre of Spanish wealth and power ; but the im- 
portance of the town has shrunk decade after decade 
until it is now a neglected cluster of hovels remarkable 
only for its melancholy reminiscences of the great Lib- 
erator, Bolivar, whose last breath was drawn in one 
of its crumbling adobe ruins. The mountains recede 
and finally disappear as the rocky headland of Vela is 
approached. This cape with the companion promon- 
tory of Gallinas was the landmark of the earliest voy- 
ages of Spanish discover3^ It was the farthest western 
headland sighted by the aspiring book- writer after whom 
a continent was named. It marked the limit of the con- 
cession granted to Las Casas by the Spanish court, when 
that humane and noble pioneer undertook to found an 
empire on principles of justice and in a spirit of good-will 



CARTAGENA AND CARACAS 229 

to native races. It is the coast boundary between Colom- 
bia and Venezuela, two rich but undeveloped countries, 
where the revolt against Spanish domain began with a 
victorious struggle and patriotic constancy. Beyond it 
lies the broad Gulf of Venezuela, and then from Cape 
St. Roman eastward the coast is guarded by a continu- 
ous mountain range. 

Venezuela may be roughly described as a triangle, 
with nearly equal sides, one of which is a coast line of 
1500 miles, another an irregular frontier running south 
from Cape Vela into the heart of the continent, and the 
third an Andean chain parallel with the maritime range. 
Within these lines is embraced an area of 632,695 square 
miles, where room for three Germanics could be found. 
The mountainous coast belt is the only one which is 
under cultivation and inhabited by whites. Out of a 
total population of 2,250,000 considerably more than 
2,000,000 is centred in the seven States bordering upon 
the sea. The cultivated belt has an average breadth of 
seventy miles except at Lake Maracaibo where it is over 
100 miles. Beyond this area of population and agri- 
culture there is a broad pastoral or grazing belt extend- 
ing to the Orinoco, and back of this there is a forest 
region of great mineral wealth, but thinly populated, 
and, in the main, unexplored. Venezuela was the first 
country on the mainland discovered by Columbus ; but 
it is among the last in the order of industrial develop- 
ment. It is known to be rich in gold, copper, iron, coal, 
and timber ; it has in the Orinoco Valley facilities for 
rivalling the Argentine and Southern Brazil as a graz- 
ing country; and it has a coffee tract unequalled in 
fertility. Under stable and progressive conditions of 
government during the last twenty years, it has been 



230 TROPICAL AMERICA 

doubling the volume of its foreign trade. With railway 
construction and irrigation on a large scale, it could be 
converted into the most prosperous State in South 
America. 

Opposite the mouth of the Gulf of Venezuela lies the 
picturesque island of Curasao, with its quaint capital, 
Willemsted, protected by two antiquated forts. This 
was taken from the Spanish by the Dutch in 1630, and 
has remained in their possession with two adjacent 
islands. Those thrifty pioneers of European trade did 
not aim to colonize the New World, so much as to carry 
on illicit commerce with the settlements of more power- 
ful nations. Curagao was admirably adapted as a slave 
mart and a smuggling centre, and until the end of the 
Napoleonic wars it was a rich and prosperous island. It 
still retains, v/ith its gables and pitched roofs, character- 
istic aspects of a Dutch colony ; but its industries have 
declined, even the famous cordial known by its name 
being now prepared in Holland from orange rind, limes, 
and spices obtained in the West Indies. Curasao as a free 
port has become the centre of an American steamship 
line's operations on the Venezuela coast. The island is 
practically a bonded warehouse which is of great service 
in promoting the interests of American trade, since 
goods not required for immediate sale in Venezuela can 
be stored there. Coro, with its port of La Vela, has a 
population of 10,000 and a large export trade in coffee, 
skins, and dyewoods. Maracaibo lies at the entrance to 
a beautiful but shallow lagoon navigable only for ves- 
sels of light draught. It has a population of 40,000, and 
is the centre of a rapidly increasing trade in coffee, hides, 
and dyewoods, being the outlet for the commerce of a 
large section of Colombia as well as for the mountain- 



CARTAGENA AND CAKA'cAS 231 

Oils region south of the lake. The bulk of the exports 
to the American market goes from this section of Vene- 
zuela, the shipments of coffee alone varying between 
$5,000,000 and $6,500,000 annually. 

The low valleys on the Venezuelan coast are preemi- 
nently adapted for the cultivation of sugar and cacao, 
and the high table-lands among the mountains for coffee 
farming. No sugar is exported, the processes of manu- 
facture being primitive, and barely enough being pro- 
duced for the home market and for the distillation of 
cheap rum for the natives. Cacao is after coffee the 
great agricultural staple. France and Germany are the 
chief markets for cacao, which is of the finest quality 
produced in South America, ranking with that of 
Ecuador. The productive zone for coffee begins at an 
elevation of 1,500 feet above the sea. The mountain 
slopes behind Lake Maracaibo and in the valleys of 
Cardcas and Valencia are the best districts. Venezuela 
is already producing 90,000,000 pounds of coffee a year, 
and is, after Brazil, the greatest storehouse for the Ameri- 
can market. The coffee belt is large enough to supply 
the whole American market, if it can be brought under 
systematic cultivation, and if adequate railway transpor- 
tation can be provided. This is now the chief disadvan- 
tage under which Venezuela labors in competing with 
Brazil, where railways traverse the coffee zones, and 
carry the product from the farms to the warehouses and 
wharves in Rio de Janeiro and Santos. The completion 
of the railways between Car4cas and Valencia, and 
between Lake Maracaibo and M^rida and other moun- 
tain towns, will be required before the coffee production 
of Venezuela can be adequately developed. The few 
railways now in operation are not built with reference 



232 TROPICAL AMERICA 

to the transportation of coffee, which is brought to the 
coast mainly on the backs of mules. 

Puerto Cabello is, after Maracaibo, the most populous 
port in Venezuela, and is connected by railway with 
Valencia, the second city. The port is crescent-shaped, 
but has an inner lagoon which with proper engineering 
works could be converted into a safe and commodious 
harbor. All the coasting steamers call at this port, 
which has a large trade in coffee, cacao, copper, fruits, 
dye woods, and hides. The finest fruit region in Vene- 
zuela is the mountainous region back of Puerto Cabello. 
La Guayra is the most important port, although it is 
an insignificant town with a population of 9,000. The 
harbor when I entered it was an unprotected roadstead, 
with a high and dangerous surf ; but the subsequent 
completion of the English port works has greatly 
improved it. The town lies on a narrow shingle of 
beach at the base of a precipitous mountain range 
sloping abruptly toward the sea. There are clusters of 
houses in ravines above the shore line ; but nature has 
interposed insuperable obstacles to the growth of the 
town. The shelving shore is so narrow, and the hill- 
sides are so steep, that La Guayra must ever remain a 
port of limited population. Its trade will always be 
large, because Caracas lies behind the mountains at a 
distance of ten miles in an air line. A railway about 
twice as long connects the capital with its port. The 
engineers in their eagerness to avoid tunnelling have 
made the railway needlessly circuitous, and have largely 
increased the expense of keeping it open during the 
season of land-slides. After heavy rains the road-bed 
is frequently impassable for several days and traffic is 
obstructed for weeks. Bolder engineers of the Meiggs 



CARTAGENA AND CARACAS 233 

type would have chosen a more direct route, constructed 
more tunnels, and diminished the liability to obstruction 
from landslides. The railway is poorly built and 
equipped in comparison with the Peruvian lines. It 
offers rare attractions to sight-seers, the marine vistas 
from the mountain slopes being magnificent. At Cara- 
cas there are three short railways leading to adjacent 
villages. The coffee and cacao collected by these lines, 
and by mule trails in the mountains, are shipped from 
La Guayra. The bulk of the foreign importations is 
also brought into the roadstead for distribution through- 
out Venezuela. 

With American, Spanish, Dutch, and German lines 
running between La Guayra and New York, and with 
two English lines calling in the roadstead on their way 
to New Orleans, there are ample facilities for rapid 
steam communication with American ports. Mails are 
received every ten days from the North Atlantic States, 
and merchandise can be ordered more promptly from 
New York than from Liverpool. Freights are low in 
consequence of sharp competition between four steam- 
ship lines. With shorter lines of ocean transportation 
to New York than to Hamburg, Havre, or Liverpool, 
Americans have a marked advantage in trade and are 
profiting by it. Venezuela is the only South American 
country where the shipping of the United States makes 
a favorable exhibit in comparison with that of mari- 
time Europe. No steamer under the American flag is 
ever seen in the ports of Uruguay, the Argentine, 
Chili, and Peru. A few sailing vessels alone compete 
in those waters for a carrying trade, which has been 
expanded many times during the last twenty years by 
the multiplication of European steamship lines. In 



234 TROPICAL AMERICA 

Venezuelan ports the American flag is constantly 
seen. 

Since 1879 the Red D. steamers have made voyages 
regularly between New York and the Spanish Main. 
These steamers were built by New York merchants, 
who had established a remunerative trade with Vene- 
zuela by means of sailing vessels. They felt the 
pressure of competition, and met it in the old-time 
spirit of American maritime enterprise. They now 
have steamers and tenders admirably adapted for the 
requirements of passenger and freight traffic. There is 
rapid steam communication under the flag and there 
is American energy on shore. The conditions have 
been favorable for the development of American com- 
merce. The imports to the United States have in- 
creased from 11,917,315 in 1869 to -$10,966,765 in 1890. 
During the same period the exports from American 
ports have expanded from $806,540 to $3,984,280. No 
European country exceeds the United States in ex- 
ports, although England is not far behind it, Avhile 
taking only one-eighth as much Venezuelan produce. 
The balance of trade is against the United States, be- 
cause every product of Venezuela is admitted in Ameri- 
can ports without payment of duties, whereas flour is 
taxed 110 per cent in return, and every other staple 
and manufacture almost as heavily. Even a moderate 
reduction of the duty on flour would double the im- 
ports received from American ports. Flour commands 
an exorbitant price, and is beyond the reach of the 
poor- and laboring classes. When the cost of bread is 
exceptionally high the tariff is suspended temporarily 
by executive degree, but as soon as the market is well 
stocked the duties are restored. Everything is taxed 



CARTAGENA AND CAEACAS 235 

and the burdens fall heavily upon the people. The 
tariff on food products is maintained, because the gov- 
erning classes consider this one of the most effective 
methods of raising revenue and increasing their oppor- 
tunities for controlling expenditures. 

I reached Caracas from La Guayra after two days' 
detention caused by landslides which blocked the rail- 
way. Lying in a fertile and well-watered valley, flanked 
by lofty mountains, it is a city of great scenic beauty. 
Rivers and brooks run through it and there are numer- 
ous bridges of iron, masonry, and wood. In this way 
the capital feebly supports the character of the country 
assigned by Amerigo Vespucci's companions, when, after 
a glimpse of the villages on the shores of Lake Mara- 
caibo, they gave to it the fantastic name of Little 
Venice. Caracas is a genuine Spanish-American capi- 
tal with characteristics of its own. It is a city with a 
population of 70,000, abounding in evidences of refine- 
ment of taste and lucidity of intelligence. 

The Capitol comprises two great buildings with Ionic 
fronts, the halls of Congress, and the Executive Man- 
sion known as the Yellow House. The material may 
be brick covered with stucco, and the buildings may be 
low structures of a single story; but the lines of the 
architecture are chaste, and broad avenues surround 
them on four sides. The houses of Congress are very 
bare ; but there is a well furnished reception-room in 
the Executive Mansion, with a large collection of por- 
traits of national heroes and statesmen. Opposite the 
Capitol is the Gothic front of the University of Vene- 
zuela, with inner courts decorated with statues, and a 
national library in the rear. The Bolivar Plaza is a 
bright and artistic centre of life in the heart of the 



236 TROPICAL AMERICA 

city, and has a large and spirited equestrian statue of 
Bolivar, perhaps the best work of sculpture to be 
seen in South America. The cathedral is a crumbling 
pile, suggesting that the earthquake which destroyed 
the town, in 1812, spared this one building ; but there 
are fine churches in Caracas, St. Anne's Basilic being the 
most elaborate in design, and St. Francisco one of the 
newest. The National Pantheon is a sombre church at 
the northern end of the city ; but it contains, where was 
once the altar, Bolivar's dust under white marble and 
a statue of the Liberator, with numerous emblematic 
figures and memorial tablets. The streets are narrow 
but well-paved and lighted. There are ten squares 
containing monuments to heroes. The shops are at- 
tractive bazaars ; the central market has a pretty little 
park beside it ; and there are signs of bustle and activ- 
ity everywhere. Caracas resembles Lima without be- 
ing mediaeval in appearance. It has been modernized, 
without being completely Europeanized, like many of 
the Spanish-American cities. 

A viaduct connecting Calvary Chapel with the Guzman 
Blanco Promenade is one of the most conspicuous public 
works. This beautiful pleasure-ground is in the heart 
of the city like St. Lucia in Santiago, and it is a lovely 
and artistic public garden, with carriage roads and foot 
paths, and a stately approach by broad stone stairways. 
A terraced park on a hillside 500 feet above the level 
of the streets, it commands broad prospects of the city, 
valley, and mountains. With its thickets of bamboos, its 
clumps of mangoes and palms, and its fountains, rose 
beds and parterres of flowers, it bears evidence to the 
refinement of taste for which Venezuelans are conspic- 
uous. The Bolivar monument has its border of for- 



CARTAGENA AND CARACAS 237 

get-me-not ; every plaza has an artistic arrangement of 
flower-beds and shrubbery ; the architecture of the town 
is singularly chaste and simple. What is lacking in 
Venezuela is not delicacy of taste but the robust fibre 
of civic virtue. 

The capital of Venezuela has the crowning glory of 
being the birthplace of Bolivar, the cradle of South 
American liberty. It reverences his memory. His 
dust is buried in its Pantheon. His statue is in its cen- 
tral plaza. Memorials of his patriotism and genius are 
seen on every side. Every coin passing from hand to 
hand in the daily traffic of the city bears his image and 
superscription. Card,cas is the city of the Liberator. 
Alas ! the traditions of his fame have not protected it 
against political usurpation and wretched travesties of 
civil liberty and republican government. 

The Venezuelan Constitution is modelled after the 
American Constitution, with modifications grounded 
upon the Calhoun doctrine of State rights. The con- 
federation consists of eight States, which are supreme 
and coordinate in their sovereign rights. The National 
Government represents, not the people, but the States. 
The Congress comprises two houses, one elected on the 
basis of population, and the other consisting of senators 
chosen by the legislatures, three from each State. This 
Congress elects a Federal Council once in two years, a 
senator and a deputy from each State delegation, and 
one additional deputy from the federal district. This 
Council of seventeen chooses a President of the Repub- 
lic for two years. It is in no sense a popular election. 
The representatives of the eight States select the 
National Executive, and remain in office during his 
term. Neither they nor he can be elected for the next 



238 TROPICAL AMERICA 

term. The States have nominally retained full sover- 
eign authority, in order to protect themselves against 
usurpations of power, and the evils of centralized gov- 
ernment. 

For all practical purposes Caracas is Venezuela in 
matters of government and legislation. The political 
cabals have ruled, and there has been centralized admin- 
istration of an extreme type. The cherished doctrine of 
State rights has been constantly nullified by the appoint- 
ment as provincial representatives of men who have 
never lived outside Caracas. All the evils of irrespon- 
sible and highly centralized power have arisen under a 
constitutional system theoretically designed to promote 
the largest development of State rights. After 1829, 
when the Republic of Colombia, whose independence 
had been won by the victories of Bolivar and Paez, was 
divided into three States, Venezuela passed through an 
exhausting period of military dictatorship and civil war. 
In 1869 opened an era of peace and progress under the 
political domination of General Guzman Blanco. For 
twenty years, whether he was the head of a Provisional 
Government established by force of arms, or the consti- 
tutional Executive, or Minister to France, his will was 
the supreme force in the State. When not occupying 
the Presidential office, he controlled the administration 
through candidates of his own, nominated and elected 
by his command. With all the vices of irresponsi- 
ble power were joined many of the virtues of enlight- 
ened government. He suppressed Clericalism and 
established genuine religious liberty. He built rail- 
ways, improved the public roads, and adorned the cities 
with stately edifices, beautiful pleasure-grounds, and 
French statuary. He developed the industries and 



CARTAGENA AND CARACAS 239 

commerce of the country, and promoted its prosperity 
by a policy at once strong and pacific. It was a system 
of political absolutism by which the government was 
virtually reduced to the level of military dictatorship. 
A reaction against it was inevitable in the liberty-loving 
country of Bolivar, a land which led the way in the 
revolt against Spanish tyranny. 

The signal for a political revolution was raised by 
university students in October, 1889. They began 
operations by flinging stones at a statue of Guzman 
Blanco in Caracas. Within twenty-four hours the 
statue was pulled down by a mob and broken into 
fragments. Another statue of the Dictator was de- 
stroyed in the capital, and a third was knocked down 
and mutilated in La Guayra. The numerous tablets 
and inscriptions which commemorated his achievements 
and public services in grandiose phrases were defaced 
or wrenched from their fastenings. Oil paintings of 
the Dictator were forcibly removed from the art gal- 
leries and other indignities were offered. It was a 
singularly effective revolution, wrought without blood- 
shed or excitement. 

This political movement was successful because Guz- 
man Blanco was in Paris, and his personal representa- 
tive in the executive office was not disposed to resent 
public affronts to his patron. The President, Dr. Rojas 
Paul, was a wise and discreet man. He had been car- 
ried into the executive office through the influence of 
the Dictator; but when once installed he began to think 
and act for himself. Probably he was weary of consult- 
ing the real ruler of Venezuela by cable at every turn 
of public affairs. Having watched the tendencies of 
popular thought, he perceived that the supremacy of the 



240 TROPICAL AMERICA 

vainglorious Dictator would not be tolerated longer. 
He made arrangements for carrying the work of the 
statue-breakers to its logical results. He reorganized 
his Cabinet so as to exclude several of the devoted 
partisans of Guzman Blanco, and brought Dr. Anduesa 
Palacio into the field as a candidate for the Presidency. 
When the Dictator resigned his post as Minister to 
France a successor was promptly appointed. The bien- 
nial election was controlled by the opponents of the 
political cabal which had governed Venezuela for 
twenty years. Anduesa who had been a member of the 
Cabinet was chosen by the Federal Council as the new 
President. 

On March 19th, 1890, I witnessed the culmination of 
this political drama in the inauguration of the President. 
It was a peaceful and orderly demonstration conducted 
with dignity and a certain degree of stateliness. The 
capital was filled with apathetic and bewildered specta- 
tors, who were hardly able to believe that for the first 
time in twenty j'-ears Guzman Blanco had ceased to be 
the power behind the throne. There was a fusillade of 
bombs and fire-crackers hy da,j, and there were glitter- 
ing showers of rockets by night. Thousands of flags 
fluttered from the house tops ; the gray lines and 
sombre effects of the architecture were completely con- 
cealed by festoons of bunting and artistic decorations ; 
archways of colored lights spanned the streets, and 
the plazas were brilliantly illuminated at night. The 
garrison of the city, numbering several thousands of 
soldiers, marched through the principal streets to the 
Yellow House, and saluted the outgoing and incoming 
Presidents. The civic ceremonies were attended by the 
Executive Council, members of Congress, the chief 
officials, and the diplomatic corps. The new President 



CARTAGENA AND CARACAS 241 

took the oath of office, and, after delivering a short but 
patriotic inaugural address, received the congratulations 
of his friends. While cannon were booming, and mili- 
tary bands were playing national airs, there was an 
undertone of public apprehension and uncertainty in 
the festivities of the day. The military parade was 
watched with apathetic interest, and the inaugural 
address, of which thousands of printed copies were 
scattered among the throng of spectators, was read 
listlessly and without outward signs of enthusiasm. It 
was a curious revelation of the characteristic attitude 
of the Spanish-American race in times of political ex- 
citement. The same torpor and indifference, which I had 
witnessed in Brazil after the revolution, was reproduced 
in the impassive faces and motionless figures of the 
populace of Caracas. The town show was mildly en- 
joyed ; but every one seemed to be under restraint, and 
there was nothing to indicate either approval or disap- 
proval of the downfall of the Dictator. 

Corruption is the commonest taint of Spanish- 
American administration, and it has been reserved for 
the country of Bolivar to acquire an unenviable distinc- 
tion in this respect. Although Guzman's long political 
reign was an era of progress and prosperity, he set the 
malign example of conducting the administration for 
personal ends. Anduesa's administration instead of 
being an era of reform, reproduced all the vices and 
corruption of the old order, and none of its progressive 
virtues. After two years it ended in civil war, usurpa- 
tion, and the enforced resignation of Anduesa. Colombia 
and Venezuela present in their political and administra- 
tive systems the most deplorable results of republican 
government without the safe-guards of enlightened 
public opinion. 



XIII 
JAMAICA AND THE BAHAMAS 

PORT ROYAL AS A NAVAL STATION — KINGSTON AND RU- 
RAL JAMAICA THE WEST -INDIAN EXHIBITION A 

CANADIAN FLIRTATION "SVITH POOR RELATIONS RECI- 
PROCITY WITH AMERICAN COMMERCIAL DEPENDENCIES 

A WORKING GOVERNOR — BAHAMA HEMP AND CANE 

SUGAR — INDUSTRIAL CONDITION OF THE BRITISH WEST 
INDIES — SAN SALVADOR 

Port Royal is the key of the West Indian Empire 
for which England made great sacrifices in her historic 
battle for supremacy with Spain and France. The con- 
quest of Jamaica by Cromwell's expedition, in 1655, a 
little more than thirty years after the earliest settle- 
ments in St. Kitts and Barbadoes, was the first blow 
aimed by a maritime rival at the Spanish Empire in the 
New World. It was the opening act of a naval drama 
in which England won, lost, and regained an empire. 
The age of Chatham witnessed the bombardment of 
Havana, the destruction of one mighty fleet after 
another, and the surrender of nearly every French island. 
The West Indian Empire seemed to have been lost after 
Yorktown when only Barbadoes and St. Lucia remained 
in the Lesser Antilles and a powerful French fleet was 
threatening the conquest of Jamaica ; but Rodney's 
courage and genius restored English prestige in the 
sea-fight off Dominica. As the Empire was left after 

242 



JAMAICA AND THE BAHAMAS 243 

the acquisition of Trinidad and British Guiana in the 
Napoleonic Wars it has remained to this day, except 
that its colonial population has been impoverished, 
brought to the verge of ruin and driven out of the 
islands by increasing hives of blacks. With the Baha- 
mas in the north, Belize in the west, and the Lesser 
Antilles in the east, curving from Porto Eico for 600 
miles toward the mouth of the Orinoco and British 
Guiana, Port Royal is the geographical centre of these 
once highly-prized and prosperous possessions. It is 
now essentially a black empire. The white settlers and 
their descendants were ruined by Emancipation, for 
which grants of 1100,000,000 from the British exchequer 
were an inadequate compensation. Immigration from 
England ceased long ago ; the whites are rapidly disap- 
pearing, and the future of the British West Indies is 
largely dependent upon the black man's lack of ambition, 
the importation of Asiatics, and an increasing market 
for tropical produce in the United States. 

England may have neglected the West Indian 
Colonies during the last two generations; but Port 
Royal is the centre of so many glorious associations and 
traditions of the founding and preservation of the 
Empire, that its dignity as a naval station is still main- 
tained. Venables, Collingwood, Benbow, Nelson, Jer- 
vis, and Rodney were once commanding figures in the 
sheltered lagoon, with its long, straggling breakwater of 
coral reef and sand. Often has it been a rendezvous for 
buccaneers' raids and naval squadrons ; and prizes taken 
from France and Spain have been condemned and sold 
there by the score. The flag still floats proudly over this 
famous naval station, a symbol of the prestige once won 
in the Caribbean at costly sacrifice of blood and treasure, 



244 TKOPICAL AMERICA 

and a sign that England is not wholly unmindful of the 
glory of her history. Guard-ships and vessels of war 
are always at anchor there ; at the dock-yards there is a 
plant for repairing ships ; and fortifications, barracks, 
hospitals, and storehouses make a brave show of impor- 
tance. The town itself is forlorn and squalid. The 
great earthquake of 1692 shattered its fortunes for all 
time, and swallowed up the records of its profligacy and 
debauchery. 

Port Royal lies on a sand-bank at the entrance of a 
deep lagoon formed by the river Cobre trickling through 
a mangrove swamp. The grass-grown palisade of sand, 
crowned here and there with stunted palms, runs inland 
for eight miles. Opposite the entrance there are bat- 
teries, and further in are the ruins of Fort Augusta 
built upon an unwholesome site where yellow fever was 
singularly fatal. In the remote reaches of the lagoon 
lies Kingston on a sloping hillside, with the impressive 
background of the Blue Mountains. When approached 
fi'om the sea it is seen for hours before the circuitous 
passage is traversed, and with the mountains wreathed 
in mist it is transfigured into loveliness. When seen 
close at hand it is something very different. It is a city 
essentially commonplace, with dull and shabby houses, 
with unpretentious and ill-designed frame buildings, 
with unpaved streets fouled by the slime of open drains, 
and with few trees and a meagre display of tropical 
vegetation. Kingston has often been devastated by fire, 
hurricane, and earthquake ; but after each disaster it has 
been rebuilt in the same offensive, inartistic way. From 
Victoria market at the water's edge, the principal busi- 
ness thoroughfare. King Street, runs up the slope of the 
hill to the parade-ground, an ill-kept park, with a few 



JAMAICA AND THE BAHAMAS 245 

fine trees and dusty beds of flowers. Queen Street 
meets this central square at a right angle with King 
Street, and is equally uninteresting. Near the parade- 
ground there is an ill-proportioned English church, 
remarkable chiefly for being the burial place of Admiral 
Benbow. The Colonial Office is a dingy square house ; 
there is a small public library ; and a miniature museum, 
a hospital and a colonial bank complete the list of local 
institutions. For a city, with a population of 40,000, 
Kingston has few attractions. The sights are exhausted 
in a few hours, and the traveller has no inclination to 
repeat them, for it is the hottest town in the West 
Indies. 

The suburbs are more attractive than the town itself. 
Beyond the Exhibition Buildings are the barracks of 
the Up-Park Camp, the headquarters of the West Indian 
regiment. On the main road toward Half- Way Tree, 
there are many pretty houses with orange groves, cocoa- 
nut clumps, and spreading mangoes about them. King's 
House, where the Governor lives, is in that quarter, 
with a beautiful lawn in front of it, and a tasteful display 
of shrubbery. The Colonial officials have houses near 
by, and there is a quaint English church, with a burying 
ground behind it. The church was built during the 
reign of Queen Anne, and is the best bit of architecture 
on the island. Rural Jamaica is very lovely indeed, 
with scenery of entrancing beauty and endless variety. 

One day I drove out to Constant Spring, and thence 
over the crest of the mountains to Castleton Gardens, 
passing hundreds of small farms where negroes were 
cultivating tobacco, maize, and yams, and here and 
there a field of cane. The road followed a winding 
ravine with rich alluvial bottom lands. The hillsides 



246 TROPICAL AMERICA 

were luxuriant with verdure, mangoes, cedars, and 
palms being prominent objects in the distant reaches. 
The majestic peaks of the Blue Mountains, 7360 feet 
high, were hidden by the lower ranges ; but there were 
grand prospects as the ridge was ascended and frequent 
glimpses of a swift-flowing river before and after the 
descent into the hollow where Castleton Gardens were 
sheltered from the winds. There had been recent rains, 
and the valleys and meadows were lovely in their fresh- 
ness and richness of tone. Another day was spent in 
Spanishtown, the old capital. Its glory has departed 
with the transfer of the government to Kingston ; but 
it is a delightfully quaint town with its deserted Spanish 
plaza, its rambling lanes and vine-covered houses, and 
its legislative halls and official residences falling into 
decay. Spanishtown is the starting-point for some of 
the most picturesque drives on the island. The best of 
these, the road to Rio Cobre Dam and Bog Walk, offers 
a succession of enchanting views, and is justly esteemed 
by the natives the finest bit of river and mountain 
scenery to be seen in the West Indies. Not content 
with driving over the road once, I returned from Bog 
Walk to Spanishtown by carriage in preference to 
taking the railway to Porus, whence I was to go to 
Mandeville, loveliest of West Indian villages. The 
English have not done all things well in Jamaica; but 
they have opened a system of roads in every quarter of 
the island which is unrivalled in the West Indies. 

The foreign visitor who remains for several weeks in 
this lovely island is impressed with a sense of the 
failure of Anglo-Saxon civilization. Kingston is one 
of the largest centres of population in the British pos- 
sessions in Tropical America. It is one of the most 




STREET SCENE, BARBADOES 



JAMAICA AND THE BAHAMAS 247 

backward and least attractive of Sontliern cities. I 
have not found any Brazilian or Spanish-American 
coast town of equal pretensions where the streets have 
been so badly paved and lighted, or where the sanitary 
conditions are so utterly neglected. In only one respect 
does Kingston compare favorably with cities of Spanish 
origin. It has an excellent system of wharves on the 
water front where steamers can receive and discharge 
cargo with facility. With its shabby and commonplace 
architecture, its neglected parks, its filthy streets and 
its surface drainage, it offers a striking contrast to 
Spanish-American coast cities. 

The religious aspects, both of the capital and of the 
island, are most appalling. The work of the Roman 
Church in Spanish America has not been perfect, but it 
has, at least, secured respect for marriage and family life. 
The English Church in the West Indies has failed to 
leaven the mass of black ignorance. The Moravians 
have been more successful in their missionary efforts, 
but they have been powerless to enforce the necessity 
of marriage or to repress the shocking immorality pre- 
vailing in the islands. The vast majority of negro and 
colored women prefer to have looser bonds than wedlock 
so that they can desert their homes, if the fathers of 
their children do not treat them well. Mr. Froude 
describes it cynically as "a very peculiar state of things, 
not to be understood, as priest and missionary agree, 
without long acquaintance." "There is immorality," 
he adds, " but an immorality which is not demoralizing." 
When one contrasts the failure of the English to inspire 
the West Indian blacks with respect for family life with 
the success of the Spanish in making marriage a relig- 
ious institution among the Indian races of the New 



248 TROPICAL AMERICA 

World, lie cannot follow Mr. Fronde's sophistries about 
the eating of forbidden fruit which brings with it no 
knowledge of the difference between good and evil. 

What, is perhaps, more discouraging than anything 
else, is the tone of hopelessness with which the officials and 
descendants of the colonists talk of the future of Jamaica, 
and the inevitable supremacy of the black race. There 
is good society in the suburbs of Kingston, and an 
incoming traveller is invariably received with hospital- 
ity and refinement of courtesy by the white residents ; 
but no one can mingle freely with them without per- 
ceiving signs of apprehension and anxiety by which 
their daily life is overclouded. I talked with men who 
lived in remote quarters of the island where large and 
successful business interests had been established, and 
they confessed that they constantly had the feeling of 
living with a sword suspended over them. There are 
mercantile centres where four or five whites live in the 
presence of thousands of blacks, who are known to be 
pulsating with ambition and unrest. "We do not talk 
very much about it," said one of these merchants, "but 
we are all looking for an earthquake which will swallow 
up the white population." The history of the island, 
with its Maroon wars and Gordon insurrection, shows 
that the colored race is not lacking in independence of 
spirit. Hayti, where an industrious French population 
was massacred in a tempest of black passion, is a warn- 
ing of what can be done anywhere in the British West 
Indies, if the colored race ever pass beyond control. 
The denunciation of Governor Eyre is also a forecast of 
the severity with which any resolute administrator will 
be condemned by the English people. 

Whether the English have legislated well or ill for 



JAMAICA AND THE BAHAMAS 249 

this once prosperous plantation colony, they have con- 
trived to empty it of its white population. The present 
Governor of Jamaica, Sir Henry Blake, may have erred 
in his choice of expedients ; but he has, at least, had the 
right aim in view in making the resources of the island 
better known abroad, in order to attract a fresh supply 
of white blood. He is to be credited with organizing 
and directing a movement for providing increased hotel 
accommodations. The theory has been that foreigners 
have not gone to Jamaica to pass the winters, because 
the old-fashioned lodging-houses and inns were inferior, 
and that the only practical method of drawing in visitors 
was to build a large number of expensive hotels with 
modern improvements. Kingston now has a very ambi- 
tious hotel at the water's edge. At Constant Spring, a 
few miles out of the city, there is another great house 
with accommodations for several hundreds of guests. 
Spanishtown has an aspiring hotel, and many other 
houses have been opened with a flourish of trumpets. 
These hotels are now lonesome and depressing barracks. 
During the Exhibition season their rooms were seldom 
filled. How they can be converted into remunerative 
investments passes comprehension. 

The Colonial Exhibition, which I visited frequently 
during my stay in the island, was a more serious attempt 
to advertise to the world, and especially to Europe, the 
resources of Jamaica. While it was not a self-support- 
ing enterprise financially, and involved a deficit in run- 
ning expenses which the subscribers to the guaranty 
fund were required to make good, it was attended by 
more than 200,000 visitors, and was a most creditable 
industrial display. The chief benefit derived by the 
island from the undertaking was the stimulative effect 



250 TROPICAL AMERICA 

of carrying out a great and useful project. Never 
■before had Jamaicans made an effort to take an account 
of their stock of resources, and to find out for themselves, 
and then to let the world know, what they could do. 

The Exhibition was organized primarily for the pur- 
pose of displaying the industrial resources of the Brit- 
ish West Indies, and of attracting European capital and 
immigration to a neglected quarter of the Empire. The 
Dominion Parliament voted a large appropriation for it, 
and appointed an energetic commission. The Canadian 
exhibit was the most pretentious one in the Main Build- 
ing, and not only occupied a good share of the space on 
the floor and in the galleries, but also called into requi- 
sition several structures outside. It was a complete 
and even brilliant display of the Canadian fisheries, 
manufactures, and produce of field, mine, and forest. It 
was under the charge of an active and intelligent staff, 
which ceased not, day nor night, to glorify the Domin- 
ion, and to depreciate the value of the American market 
as the base of exchange for West Indian products. For 
six months there was a most determined effort to draw 
the islands into a scheme of commercial union, from 
which Canada would have everything to gain and Eng- 
land's West Indian possessions everything to lose. In 
this movement the Canadian Finance Minister took an 
active part, visiting the principal islands and boldly 
advocating a colonial trade bund based upon preferen- 
tial tariff schedules. 

It was not until Canada was deprived of many of its 
commercial privileges in the American market that its 
ministers began to take any interest in the West Indies. 
Then there was a change of attitude. Canada, instead 
of offering cold shoulder and cynical advice to the West 



JAMAICA AND THE BAHAMAS 251 

Indians, as Mr. Froude has represented her as doing after 
the rejection of the first American sugar treaty, fairly 
embarrassed them with the warmth and intensity of her 
affection. The once despised Jamaica, which had seemed 
a long way off and to have an impoverished non-con- 
suming population of ignorant blacks, suddenly loomed 
up before the eyes of the Ottawa Ministers as a thrifty 
and prosperous island tenanted by loyal Britons ; and 
the West Indian archipelago from Trinidad to Barba- 
does, from Grenada to Dominica, and from Antigua to 
the Bahamas, assumed the importance of a commercial 
empire held by the Queen's worshipful subjects of the 
same breed as themselves. Then it seemed the most 
natural thing in the world that brethren should dwell 
together in unity and be wholly independent of the 
United States, which, after all,' was not a larger market, 
at least in extent of territory, than British North 
America ! 

Sir Henry Blake during the Exhibition period lis- 
tened with a rapt air to the Canadian cuckoo song and 
seemed almost willing to be convinced that there were 
millions of fur traders in the barren stretches of Hud- 
son's Bay territory, who were athirst for Jamaica rum 
with sugar in it, and that in the regions toward the 
North Pole there were other millions of Esquimaux 
who were hungering after bananas and oranges to eat 
with their ice-cream. The necessity for being polite to 
his guests and patrons passed with the close of the 
Exhibition, and the commercial statistics of the island 
unerringly revealed the superiority of the American 
market as a base of trading operations. The official 
returns published in 1891 showed that, while Canada 
bought $183,775 of Jamaica produce and sold $721,765 



252 TROPICAL AMERICA 

in return, the United States purchased $3,966,550 and 
supplied $2,722,650 in provisions and manufactures. 
Canada, while selling four times as much as it bought, 
was not in a position to ask for differential advantages 
in furnishing Jamaica with flour, fish, lumber, coal, and 
manufactures. The United States, while buying twenty- 
one times as much as Canada and selling less than 
four times as much, was clearly entitled to preferential 
arrangements in the export trade, since it could offer 
with its population of 63,000,000 a vastly superior 
market for sugar, coffee, and fruit than Canada with 
its population of 5,000,000. 

The question which the planters of the islands were 
invited by the Canadian Minister of Finance to de- 
termine was whether they could afford to be deprived 
of their free market in the United States for all their 
produce except oranges, for the sake of accommodating 
the Dominion, which had been injured by American 
tariff legislation. If they were to discriminate in favor 
of a vastly inferior customer, who was already selling 
to them four times as much as it was buying, the effect 
of the transaction would be inevitably to subject their 
own sugar, coffee, and hides to import duties in the 
United States. They might not be willing to enter into 
commercial union with the United States, but they were 
unprepared to fling away the advantages of their largest 
market by supporting Canada's demand for preferential 
trade. 

The new proposals of the United States were based 
upon a free market for sugar, coffee, and hides, but the 
advantages were to be shared equally by Brazil and 
the Spanish West Indies. It was not so generous as the 
previous proposal, which had been vetoed by England ; 



JAMAICA AND THE BAHAMAS 253 

but it was made by the best customer whom the islands 
had. Before I left Jamaica, news was received of the 
negotiation of a reciprocity agreement between Spain 
and the United States, by which a free market for 
Cuban sugar had been • permanently secured. That 
announcement brought the Canadian flirtation to a 
close. The acceptance of the American offer by Spain 
made it impossible for the British West Indies to reject 
it. The British planters were sending $13,000,000 of 
sugar to the American market against $43,000,000 
which was exported from Cuba and Porto Rico. It 
was their chief staple, and they could not sell it any- 
where else ; and if duties were imposed upon it in 1892, 
it could not be sold even there. Those duties, which 
would follow their neglect to modify their own tariffs, 
would be a discrimination in favor of the Spanish 
islands against the British West Indies. Their principal 
industry would be ruined, while American capital and 
machinery were going into Cuba and promoting its 
commercial revival. This was the logic of the economic 
situation, and before the year ended British Guiana, the 
Leeward and Windward Islands, Jamaica, Barbadoes, 
and Trinidad made the best bargain they could at 
Washington for the permanent retention of the free 
market. Their own tariffs, which had been ingeniously 
devised so as to tax American food products heavily 
and English manufactures lightly, were readjusted on 
equitable conditions of trade. The Colonial Office, 
which had once interposed its veto, was powerless to 
obstruct reciprocity. England had done nothing for 
the sugar islands since the Emancipation period. It 
had opened its own ports to sugar from all the world 
and had left the principal industry of its West Indian 



254 TROPICAL AMERICA 

possessions to decline, while Europe was stimulating 
the cultivation of the sugar beet by bounties and sup- 
porting it by superior facilities for technical education. 
To have closed the American market by a second veto 
upon commercial union would have completed their 
ruin. 

Nine governors are employed to direct the destinies 
of the British West Indies. They draw their salaries, 
respect the traditions of the Colonial Office, entertain 
the officers of Her Majesty's fleet, exercise supreme legis- 
lative, judicial, and executive powers, and strive to con- 
ciliate in every possible way the black constituencies by 
fictitious concessions. In the main these functionaries 
are content to wind and unwind the red tape spools of 
the Colonial Office, and to make tariffs in the interest 
of English manufacturers. They are drawn helplessly 
along in the drift of West Indian tendencies. There 
has been constant experimenting with constitutions and 
franchises. The general trend of events and tenden- 
cies is in the direction of negro rule. The whites, dis- 
heartened by the economic conditions and despairing of 
receiving reinforcements of European immigrants, are 
selling their plantations and rapidly disappearing from 
the islands. In Jamaica there are 700,000 blacks and 
15,000 whites, and in other islands the preponderance of 
dark blood is even greater. In Trinidad and British 
Guiana coolie labor has been introduced with marked 
success, and in Jamaica the same experiment has been 
satisfactorily tested ; but in the main the industries of 
the islands are dependent upon an indolent colored race, 
which is already impressed with the conviction that it 
is destined to govern and own the British West Indies. 
What is needed is European immigration on a large 



JAMAICA AND THE BAHAMAS 255 

scale and the investment of English capital in new and 
profitable industries, in order to secure the maintenance 
of white ascendency and the material development of 
the islands. 

A work of this kind has been undertaken by the gov- 
ernor of the Bahamas, Sir Ambrose Shea, an oificial 
with a soul above red tape. A few weeks before my 
journey to Jamaica I had paid him a visit at Nassau and 
had been greatly impressed with the industrial policy 
which he has introduced there. When he first reached 
his post, he found a few minor industries, which were 
languidly operated, but were not a substantial source of 
colonial wealth. He noticed a species of cactus, known 
in the Bahamas as the Pita, growing neglected and 
despised among the rocks. His experienced eye recog- 
nized in the long, sharp-pointed leaves a valuable fibre 
material. Discerning with keen intelligence the eco- 
nomic basis of a new industry of great promise, he sent 
to London samples of rope crudely manufactured from 
the leaves of the largest plants. There the fibre was 
pronounced by experts to be equal, if not superior, to 
the best manila hemp. After obtaining the sanction 
of the colonial legislators for the sale of Crown lands for 
the cultivation of sisal, he hastened to London, where 
he succeeded in interesting capitalists in his project. 
Large tracts in New Providence and other islands were 
purchased, cleared, and planted. At first a bounty was 
offered for the promotion of the industry, but this was 
speedily suspended. So numerous were the applica- 
tions from foreign investors that the price of land rose 
from $1.25 to $4 an acre. As unrestricted sale of land 
would have involved not only the cheapening of the 
product, but also serious difficulties respecting the labor 



256 Tropical America 

supply, restrictions were placed upon the cultivation of 
fibre plants. The governor provided a safeguard against 
overproduction by limiting the number of acres to be 
sold, and sought to prevent a scarcity of labor in any 
quarter by a careful distribution of allotments of land. 
He also aimed to raise the standard of labor by enabling 
colored people to buy land on the easiest possible terms. 

The governor's industry, as he described it to me, is 
in an experimental stage. The fibre produced has been 
from old plants growing wild in the islands. The plan- 
tations started under his administration will not bear 
leaves with fibre of the requisite quality before 1895. 
Then the financial results of his industrial policy will 
be known. In any event the cultivation of Bahama 
hemp promises to carry into the millions the exports of 
the islands, which now amount to 1650,000 annually. 
The industry has already attracted English investors, 
and has increased the valuation of land $1,250,000. 

Sir Ambrose Shea is ridiculed by the incredulous 
as a monomaniac. Certainly he talks and apparently 
thinks of little except Bahama hemp. There has been, 
however, much reason in his madness, and an industry 
admirably adapted to the soil, the climate, and the con- 
ditions of labor has been introduced. He believes that 
it will be a source of wealth, and he is anticipating the 
new era of industrial development by improving the 
communications of the islands with one another and 
the world. If his policy be successful, it will convert 
Nassau into one of the commercial centres of the West 
Indies. Certainly, monomania which takes the form of 
intense zeal for the enlargement of industrial resources 
and the promotion of the prosperity of all classes of the 
colonial population is so rare as to be phenomenal. 



JAMAICA AND THE BAHAMAS 257 

Since the Emancipation year the British colonists in 
the West Indies have been constantly Avarned against 
dependence upon cane sugar, but the introduction of 
new industries has been attended with great difficulty 
and with meagre results. Cacao has been successfully 
cultivated in Trinidad, where there is also a large 
export of asphalt. Grenada has an extensive cacao 
tract. The Windward Islands and Dominica raise 
small quantities of coffee, cacao, and cotton. Montser- 
rat has a petty industry in limes, and dyewoods are 
shipped from all the islands. In Jamaica, where the 
sugar production has had a very marked decline, the 
coffee exports have remained stationary, the industry 
being largely conducted by black peasant proprietors on 
a small scale. Intelligent labor is lacking there for a 
large development of tobacco farming. Logwood con- 
tinues to be exported in considerable quantities, but 
most of it consists of old stumps and roots, the remnant 
of more active enterprise in earlier days. The island's 
exports during recent years would have declined, if the 
fruit trade had not been organized on a large scale by a 
few enterprising Americans. St. Ann's Bay, Falmouth, 
Port Antonio, and Kingston have been converted into 
great centres for the shipment of bananas and oranges 
to the United States market, and a large fleet of steam- 
ers has been employed in the service. Very active 
competition for the control of the fruit trade has fol- 
lowed, and the export of bananas has been largely 
increased. 

The opening of numerous banana tracts in Cen- 
tral America threatens to reduce this trade. While I 
was in the island, one of the largest American houses 
withdrew its fleet, sold out a valuable trading plant, and 



258 TROPICAL AMERICA 

transferred its operations to Honduras. Shrewd men 
in the trade already perceive that Jamaica cannot com- 
pete permanently with Central America in supplying 
the American market. Its bananas have to be trans- 
ported by mule or wagon from the interior, and the 
expense is thereby largely increased. Plantations situ- 
ated on rivers like the Bluefields in Nicaragua have a 
great advantage over those in Jamaica, as steamers can 
call at their wharves for the fruit and the cost of ship- 
ment is heavily reduced. Central America is destined 
to be the chief banana farm of the United States. The 
banana trade of Jamaica is exposed already to sharp 
competition from that quarter. As for oranges, while 
there is fine fruit in the island, it is virtually the wild 
stock, planted from seeds and unimproved by bud- 
ding and grafting. While Florida has been steadily 
developing improved methods of orange cultivation, 
Jamaica has continued to raise the old stock. 

While the sugar industry is declining in Jamaica 
and the Leeward Islands, and cannot be maintained in 
Barbadoes, the Windward group, Trinidad, and British 
Guiana, without commercial union with the United 
States, fruit and cacao are meagre substitutes for it as 
sources of wealth. If anything is to be made of the 
islands, it is through the introduction of new industries 
like Sir Ambrose Shea's Bahama hemp. If he succeeds 
in attracting English capital and immigration a great 
impulse will be imparted to the fortunes of what has 
been considered the poorest group of islands in the 
archipelago. It is in the Bahamas, if anywhere, that 
there are signs of the dawn of a new industrial era. 
Sisal can be cultivated in Jamaica and the Virgin and 
Leeward Islands. There can be as wide a range of 



JAMAICA AND THE BAHAMAS 259 

fibre plants in. the West Indies as in Mexico. The 
United States has recently placed a high premium upon 
this class of industries by opening a free market for raw 
fibre. 

It is at least a pleasant fancy that the despised 
Bahamas, which were the first coral reefs sighted by 
Columbus, have the promise of an industrial future. 
San Salvador is a low-lying line of beach between 
Eleutheria and Long Island on the outer rim of the 
Great Bahama Bank. A headland at the southern end 
bears the discoverer's name ; but there are few signs 
of that loveliness of verdure which he described with 
rapture to his sovereigns upon his return to Spain. It 
is now tenanted by a few hundreds of negroes who 
make a scanty living by fishing and raising oranges and 
pineapples. As it lies in the track of New York 
steamers bound for the south coast of Cuba, Jamaica, 
and the Isthmus, it comes frequently under the eyes 
of travellers, and never without exciting emotion and 
interest. That shingle of white beach had in it the 
promise of a New World to be added to the resources of 
civilization. Dull, indeed, must be the soul that fails 
to appreciate in some degree the significance of its dis- 
covery. Unconscious of the great part which it has 
played in history, it now shrinks from close scrutiny. 
Before a decade ends it may be the centre of hemp 
plantations, and be restored to the modern world of 
industry after four centuries of neglect. 



XIV 

THE LAST SPANISH STRONGHOLD 

ALONG THE CUBAN COAST — EXPEDIENTS FOR HARASSING 

AMERICAN SHIPPING VANITT FAIR IN CIENFUEGOS 

ASPECTS OF THE CUBAN CAPITAL — SIGNS OF EXHAUSTION 
IN MATANZAS AMERICAN OPPORTUNITIES AND RESPON- 
SIBILITIES — THE LAST MARKET FOR CANE SUGAR — UN- 
RECIPROCAL PROTECTION RUINOUS TO CUBA — HAVANA 
HELPLESS BUT WASHINGTON POWERFUL — ANNEXATION 
AND COMMERCIAL UNION 

Cape Maisi is the land first sighted when Cuba is 
approached from the Bahamas and the Windward Chan- 
nel. It is a barren coast that meets the stranger's 
eyes until Guantanamo Bay is entered, and the Sierra 
Maestra becomes the background for impressive scenery. 
This is the first of a series of spacious bays with which 
the island is encircled. Havana, Matanzas, Nuevitas, 
and Neve on the north, and Guantanamo, Santiago, 
and Cienfuegos on the south have harbors unrivalled 
in the West Indies. Here is the suggestion for an argu- 
ment from Nature in favor of the closest commercial 
relations between the United States and Cuba. Let 
it be conceded that the physical forces shaping the con- 
figuration of the coasts of the island were directed by 
reason and benignant purpose, and it will folloAV that 
the harbors were designed to facilitate commercial ex- 
changes with the adjacent continent, the home of the 
260 



THE LAST SPANISH STRONGHOLD 261 

American branch of the English-speaking race. In 
Nature's bold hand, Commercial Union may be traced 
in the deep indentations of the seaboard. On moun- 
tain sides stored with iron, manganese, and mineral 
wealth, in forests of the interior practically unexplored, 
and in valleys and level tracts unsurpassed for fertility, 
the same words are written in letters large. 

At Guantanamo I caught a first near glimpse of 
Cuba, and heard an intelligent discussion of the indus- 
trial state of the island. A prominent sugar-planter of 
the south side took passage on the steamer for Santi- 
ago, and was unreserved in conversation. It was early 
in January, 1891, or about five months before the com- 
mercial treaty was negotiated with Spain. A delega- 
tion, representing nearly all the industrial interests 
of Cuba, was then in Madrid urging compliance with 
the reciprocity requirements of the United States, but 
apparently without hope of influencing the Spanish 
Government. I asked this planter what would be the 
result if Spain were to refuse to negotiate a treaty with 
the United States during the year. "A revolution in 
the island," was the quick response. It seemed a 
startling prediction to me then, but before I had been 
in Cuba a month it had been repeated a hundred times. 

Another fellow-passenger, who knew Cuba well, was 
the superintendent of the Juragua mines near Santiago. 
Less than ten years ago the first iron claim in the moun- 
tains was officially recognized. Now there are three 
American corporations developing large tracts of rich 
mining territory, building railways to the coast, and 
exporting ore to Pennsylvania. The oldest of these 
companies employs 2000 miners and railway workmen, 
has a rolling stock of 1600 cars, and requires for the 



262 TROPICAL AMERICA 

transportation of its ore a fleet of twenty steamers. It 
is most valuable ore, and the mountains seem from sur- 
face indications to be well stocked with it. The Span- 
ish Government has promoted the development of these 
properties, and the industrial results are proving bene- 
ficial to Eastern Cuba. Immigration has been encour- 
aged, employment has been offered to an impoverished 
population, and the business interests of Santiago have 
been powerfully aided by mining enterprise. The same 
government by responding favorably to the American 
offer to negotiate an equitable reciprocity treaty, has 
stimulated investment of American capital in sugar 
plantations and improved machinery by which the 
chief industry of the island will be rendered vastly 
more profitable. What Cuba needs to-day is the reor- 
ganization of its agricultural system with foreign capi- 
tal so as to secure more economical production of its 
great staples. 

There is one Caribbean seaboard that rivals Eastern 
Cuba in boldness and grandeur, — the mountainous coast 
of Venezuela; but there is no harbor on the Spanish Main 
to be compared with Santiago de Cuba. The rock- 
bound coast sullenly opens its granite gates, and jeal- 
ously guards the entrance to a spacious bay flanked by 
mountains. One of the giant cliffs sloping abruptly 
seaward is crowned with a gray fortress. So narrow is 
the entrance that the ship seems to pass directly under 
the antique battlements, and the sentinels on the stone 
terraces, and the prisoners behind the barred windows, 
are almost within call. The harbor opens and widens 
as the ship sails on until it is a placid expanse of shel- 
tered water, with blue mountains encircling it, and the 
city a long way in the distance transfigured in the 



THE LAST SPANISH STRONGHOLD 263 

golden light of a tropical morning. Like Rio de 
Janeiro it lies among hills with mountains encamped 
about it, with islands bristling with fortifications, and 
with seaward defences which could be made impreg- 
nable, even with meagre engineering skill. Like the 
Brazilian capital also, it is a foul and shabby town, 
unworthy of its magnificent surroundings. 

There had been an outbreak of yellow fever among 
the Spanish miners in the mountains, and the sanitary 
condition of the town was so dangerous that I was glad 
to continue my journey along the south coast. I sailed 
with Captain Colton, of whom a good story can be told. 
Owing to bad weather at Nassau he was once com- 
pelled to leave port without landing a portion of his 
cargo. When he arrived at the Cuban ports he reported 
the case, and announced that he would land the cargo 
on the return trip, and send by mail a certificate from 
the Spanish Consul at Nassau that the goods had been 
put ashore there. The custom-house officials would 
not listen to him, but refused to clear his ship because 
cargo not intended for Cuba had been brought in. He 
allowed them half an hour in which to come to a decis- 
ion. He told them that in order to protect the lives of 
his passengers, and to save his ship, he had been com- 
pelled to leave Nassau without landing a portion of his 
cargo, and announced that if they refused to clear the 
vessel, he would abandon it where it lay at anchor, hold 
them responsible for the consequences, and take his 
crew in a body to Havana before the Consul-General 
to protest against their conduct. It was a bold stroke ; 
but Captain Colton knew the men with whom he was 
dealing. They promptly cleared the ship. 

More of this spirit of aggressiveness is needed in 



264 TROPICAL AMERICA 

Cuba. For two generations American diplomacy has 
been too lax in resenting Spanish exactions. In the 
Virginius affair, the courageous English commander 
who trained the guns of his ship upon Santiago and 
threatened to destroy the city, if the executions in the 
prison were not immediately suspended, taught Ameri- 
cans how to secure respect for a flag; but the State 
Department frittered away its resources and allowed 
itself to be duped and defrauded out of adequate repara- 
tion. When the United States chooses to exert its 
power wrongs are at once redressed in Cuba. More 
warnings are needed like President Cleveland's proc- 
lamation in 1886, threatening to reimpose the retalia- 
tory duties on Spanish bottoms, if American ships were 
not accorded their full privileges under the commercial 
agreement of 1884. That menace sufficed to liberate 
the forces of public opinion on the island, to alarm 
Spanish ship-owners, and to compel the government at 
Madrid to accede to the American demand. Neverthe- 
less the officials have persevered in violating the princi- 
ple of equality of flags, which was the basis of that 
agreement, and they have not been compelled to desist. 
Ordinarily there is not strength enough in the bow 
of American diplomacy. Spanish-American countries 
understand this, and constantly take advantage of the 
indulgence and good-nature of the State Department. 

The Spanish custom officials, for example, have 
devised an ingenious method of harassing American 
shipping interests by a system of fines imposed for triv- 
ial clerical errors and shortages of cargo, when there is 
no intent to defraud the government of the island. In 
the United States penalties are never imposed when 
there has evidently been no breach of good faith on the 



THE LAST SPANISH STEONGHOLD 265 

part of the shipper; but in Cuba advantage is taken of 
every technical irregularity. The moiety system, by 
■which the informer receives a portion of the fine, stim- 
ulates the zeal of custom-house operators. Diplomatic 
correspondence has been carried on for years in relation 
to these cases vs^ithout effect. The customs officials 
have their living to make by their wits at the expense 
of American ship-owners. Although the commerce of 
the island is almost wholly with the United States, and 
largely under the American .flag, Washington diplo- 
macy seems to be helpless to enforce shipping rights 
secured by treaty. 

Cienfuegos, the terminus of the American line of 
steamers, and of the western railway system of Cuba, 
is a modern town built since the present century 
opened. It has a fine harbor and a growing trade, and 
is the commercial centre of thirty of the largest sugar 
plantations of the island. While having only one-half 
of the population of Santiago, it is a cleaner, more 
cheerful, and more interesting town. It has excellent 
hotel accommodations for the latitude, and with sugar 
and tobacco plantations near by, offers much enter- 
tainment to strangers. Sunday is the gala-day of the 
week, as is customary in Spanish- American towns. 
The clergy are so accommodating as to have the last 
service in the cathedral over by nine or ten o'clock in 
the morning. This leaves nearly a full day for cock- 
fights, horse-racing, and the promenade in the plaza, 
which has a broad stone walk lined at the sides with 
benches for the accommodation of chaperons. It is a 
handsome square, well lighted by electricity and bor- 
dered by the best buildings of the town, — the cathedral, 
theatre, public library, a large club-house, and a popu- 
lar caf^. 



266 TROPICAL AMERICA 

This Sunday evening promenade is one of the social 
institutions of Cuba. During the week young women 
are not allowed to go out alone, but are constantly 
watched, kept under rigid restraint, and invariably 
accompanied by their elders or by servants in their 
walks about the town. This system of supervision 
would be intolerably irksome to the mothers and guar- 
dians of the blooming senoritas, if marriage were not 
arranged at a very early age. At thirteen or fourteen 
a Cuban girl is supposed to be ready for marriage, and 
a match is made for her by her parents as soon as pos- 
sible. Meanwhile, during the transition stage, she is 
closely watched, and not allowed to make acquaintance 
with men. She is kept under guard during the week, 
biit on Sunday night she is exhibited to all comers. 
The mothers and chaperons accompany the giddy young 
creatures to the plaza, and leave them at liberty to stroll 
up and down the stone walk in company with girls of 
their acquaintance, while they themselves occupy the 
side benches where they can overlook the scene and 
keep their eyes upon them. The whole town goes out 
to see the show. For three hours all the young unmar- 
ried women tramp up and down, dressed in their pretti- 
est gowns and displaying their charms, while hundreds 
of young men join the procession and exchange glances, 
if not words, with them. Anything like an incipient 
flirtation or an indiscretion brings the stern mother upon 
the scene, and the foolish, saucy girl is dragged home- 
ward prematurely and kept indoors the following Sun- 
day. Hour after hour the promenaders are in motion, 
girls of thirteen and fourteen being the belles of the 
walk, and a great concourse of carefully dressed and 
profusely powdered men watching them with eager in- 
terest. It is the Cuban Vanity Fair. 



THE LAST SPANISH STRONGHOLD 267 

Notwithstanding the decline in the fortunes of the 
planters, their houses are very agreeable interiors, and 
their hospitality is unaffected and charming. It is 
difficult for a foreigner to break the ice, and to estab- 
lish confidential relations with the planters ; but when 
this has been done invitations follow, and there are 
frequent glimpses of Cuban home-life. So rigid are 
the requirements of custom and etiquette, that it is 
only at home, and in the presence of members of the 
household, that well-born daughters are to be seen at 
all. It is only in the conventional reception-room, 
furnished with long rows of cane-seat rocking-chairs, 
that their acquaintance can be made, and then only 
under watchful supervision. They are little women, 
short in stature, plump and well rounded in figure, 
graceful and supple in movement, with dark eyes that 
flash at night and melt by day. Like the beautiful 
wild flowers of the Cuban woods, they mature very 
early, and they fade as rapidly. The prettiest girl will 
be plain long before she is thirty. Handsome women 
in middle life are never seen in the tropics, but only in 
the temperate zone. The beauty and charm of Cuban 
women is evanescent, but real and irresistible, while it 
lasts. 

Cienfuegos is one of the centres of the sugar indus- 
try, and many of the finest plantations and mills are in 
close communication with it either by railway or water. 
I was so fortunate as to receive an invitation to visit 
Soledad, which has the reputation of being one of the 
best-managed plantations on the island. It produced 
in 1891 about 14,000,000 pounds of sugar. Other 
plantations largely exceed it in cultivated area and me- 
chanical resources, the Constancia having a product of 



268 TROPICAL AMERICA 

40,000,000 pounds; but Soledad is conducted on scien- 
tific principles and with American thrift, thoroughness, 
and organization, so that there is the greatest saving 
in the cost of production, and the largest margin for 
profit on the investment. At one plantation near Ma- 
tanzas and at another in the Cienfuegos district the 
cane, instead of being ground by milling machinery, is 
cut up into small pieces, and the sugar is worked out 
of it by water by a process of diffusion similar to that 
employed in the manufacture of beet sugar. It would 
be a singular result if this method were to be adopted 
generally in Cuba as a means of cheapening and enlarg- 
ing the cane product. One of the most experienced 
planters in Matanzas told me that he believed that this 
would be one of the effects of free coal, which is pro- 
vided for by the reciprocity treaty. The diffusion 
process involves the necessity of burning coal, and so 
long as a heavy duty was imposed upon it economical 
production was impracticable. With free coal, and the 
iron-ore steamers available for bringing it from Pennsyl- 
vania at low freight charges, a revolution in the current 
processes of making cane sugar may be impending. 

The struggle between cane and beet will inevi- 
tably be one of the sharpest industrial conflicts known 
in the history of manufacture. Whether Cuban cane 
can hold its own against European and American beet, 
is a question which not even experts in the business 
venture to answer. But one thing is certain: if the 
cane-sugar industry of the Spanish West Indies is to 
keep its ground against the destructive competition of 
the bounty-fed beet, it can only be through processes of 
economical production, and with the improved machin- 
ery employed in plantations like Soledad. Not only is 



THE LAST SPANISH STRONGHOLD 269 

the American market needed for Cuban sugar, but 
American capital, system, and habits of organization 
are required as well. 

Fine tobacco plantations are also to be seen in the 
Manicaragua valley near Cienfuegos. The methods of 
cultivation and curing are uniform throughout Cuba, 
the characteristic differences in the color and flavor 
of the leaf being largely due to qualities of soil. The 
world smokes too much to enjoy the luxury of the pure 
Havanas of earlier days. The district where the choic- 
est leaf is produced in the Vuelta de Abajo is of limited 
area. It is surrounded by belts in which leaf of excel- 
lent color, but lacking in delicacy of aroma, is produced. 
It is soil rather than climate that regulates the quality 
of tobacco, and while the plant grows readily through- 
out Western Cuba, and in certain districts near Matan- 
zas, Cienfuegos, and Santiago, it is only from a com- 
paratively small area that the best leaf can be obtained, 
and then only when the plants are trimmed after 
budding. The demand for well-known brands is very 
great, and it has to be met in some way. I was told 
in Santiago and Cienfuegos, that much of the tobacco 
raised there was sent to Havana, and made up as cigars 
passing under the best names. The deterioration in 
the quality of Cuban cigars imported into the New 
York market during recent years is undoubtedly to be 
accounted for by the artificial widening of the Vuelta 
de Abajo preserves, so as to include various hot tobac- 
cos, similar in color, but inferior in aroma. There are 
large areas cultivated under contracts by which the 
producers receive fixed prices for plants according to 
their height. This system, with the indiscriminate 
method of drying plants instead of sorting and then 



270 TROPICAL AlVIERICA 

curing the leaves, is promoting deterioration of quality. 
While the tobacco produce of the island is increasing 
steadily in volume, the planters and manufacturers are 
trading largely upon their former prestige. 

From Cienfuegos there are two routes to Havana. 
One is by railway, involving an early start^ four 
changes of cars, and a full day's ride. The other is 
by steamer to Batabano, requiring a night and a morn- 
ing on the sea, and a two hours' journey by rail across 
the island. The second is preferable on many accounts, 
and, especially, because the steamer scenes are character- 
istic of the country, and, therefore, especially interesting 
to strangers. Each steamer carries cattle in the lower 
deck, and a motley company of Spanish soldiers and 
noisy Cubans. The soldiers camp out on deck, and 
lie mummied in their blankets while asleep, and in the 
morning they are fed from kettle^, the spoon passing 
from man to man very much as the pipe of peace is 
smoked in an Indian camp. They are a noisy rabble, 
shouting, gesticulating, and singing when they are not 
sunning themselves on deck with their blankets wrapped 
about their heads like clumsy hoods. The Cubans do 
not fraternize with the soldiers, but remain at the other 
end of the boat, singing, gambling in the saloon, and 
lingering affectionately over their cocktails. A dozen 
nuns are among them, watching the roistering scenes 
with unaffected interest, and cautiously retiring to a 
quiet corner when the uproar becomes scandalous. As 
the steamer approaches the wharf at Batabano there is 
a medley of singing, shouting, and swearing, with the 
accompaniment of accordions, guitars, and fifes. 
Cubans, like all Spanish Americans, are passionately 
fond of noise and excitement. It is what makes their 
life worth living. 



THE LAST SPANISH STRONGHOID 271 

A train is already drawn up to carry the passengers 
of the crowded steamer to Havana; but it is a long, 
dreary time before it is in motion. There are two 
engines at hand and switches conveniently placed for 
the rapid making-up of trains ; but neither one nor the 
other is used. A pair of oxen is employed in hauling 
one car after another into place, while the engines stand 
motionless on the track. Why the engines are not 
brought into use to facilitate the operation, and to start 
the train on time, the most ingenious Yankee will be 
unable to find out. Possibly it is because Columbus 
used oxen for making up his trains when he first visited 
Cuba, and the Spanish ruling class does not favor 
radical reforms. 

A railway ride across Cuba from Batabano discloses 
vistas of undulating levels and moors under poor cul- 
tivation, relieved only by sentinel palms of the royal 
guard, or by encampments of palmettos, or by strag- 
gling cabins with palm-leaf roofs. Raptures over tropi- 
cal vegetation and semi-Saracenic architecture are tran- 
sitory vagaries in Havana. The harbor, with its long 
line of high-bastioned fortifications flanking the low 
peninsula upon which the city stands, is an imposing 
pageant especially under a moonlit sky; but the coun- 
try about the city is flat and unimpressive. The laurels 
and other shade trees in the avenues and plazas have an 
ill-nourished and stunted look. The Bishop's garden 
in Tulipan was once a lovely retreat, but it is now neg- 
lected ground. The finest drives in Havana are those 
to the Cerro and to Vedado ; but there are few luxuriant 
tropical trees to be seen by the way, and not many 
orange groves and banan^ clumps. The Botanical 
Gardens, and the grounds about the Captain-General's 



^ 



272 TROPICAL AMERICA 

country-seat, offer the only really satisfactory glimpse 
of tropical foliage to be obtained in Havana. 

Cuba, while the most accessible, is also the most 
representative foreign country which Americans can 
visit on their own continent. Havana, whether more 
or less Cuban than it is Spanish, is a city utterly unlike 
any large American centre of population. It is the 
last stronghold of Spain in the New World where her 
empire was once undisputed. There are vivid contrasts 
of architecture, foliage, and customs. From the moment 
of passing the grim Morro, the Cabanas fortifications, 
and the battery at the Point, the visitor is conscious of 
being among an alien race, whose sympathies, manner 
of life, ideas of morals and religion, habits and recrea- 
tions, are not in accord with his own. Havana is the 
most distinctively Spanish capital in Tropical America. 
A Spaniard fresh from the historic Peninsula feels more 
at home there than anywhere else in the New "World. 

I went to Havana with a strong feeling of sympathy 
for a people gloomy and despairing, lying bound and 
fettered in the outer darkness of political despotism, 
overawed by a foreign garrison of 60,000 soldiers, 
despoiled of their liberties, denied the rights of public 
meeting and a free press, subjected to unceasing police 
espionage and the risks of arbitrary arrest, and plundered 
by tax-gatherers and lawless bandits. I found before 
a fortnight had passed that much of my sympathy was 
misplaced. Cuba was very different from what I had 
imagined it to be. It was suffering less from political 
tyranny than from violations of economic law. The 
people were poor, but not so unhappy that they failed 
to get a great deal of pleasure out of life. They were 
denied autonomy and representation; but they had more 



THE LAST SPANISH STRONGHOLD 273 

personal liberty and suffered less from ecclesiastical 
bigotry and irresponsible power than the population of 
Spain. The main body of soldiers in the island is a 
volunteer force of perhaps 40, 000 or 50, 000 men. It is 
called a Spanish garrison, and is the main support of 
the government in an emergency; but it is not under 
pay, and it is recruited from the native population. It 
is required to drill regularly and to guard the custom- 
houses and government buildings. Whether it can be 
depended upon to take the part of the Administration 
against the people in a revolution is an open question. 
When one learns that the main force by which the 
people are held under the galling yoke of a tyranny fre- 
quently described as worse than the White Czar's is 
manned by hack-drivers, porters, street-pedlers, bar- 
bers, restaurant-clerks, and salesmen in the shops, his 
preconception of the terrors of military government is 
sensibly modified. The fortifications at the entrance 
of the harbors, some of them splendid relics of the 
science of Vauban and his school, are occupied by reg- 
ulars, and the foreign force is brought constantly under 
the public eye and ostentatiously shifted from one 
quarter of the island to another; but there is nothing 
formidable in the military armaments of Spain in Cuba. 
The island is not overrun with a horde of foreign 
soldiery. 

It is not the Havana of the devastating Patriot War, 
nor of the barbarous executions of the Virginius, that is 
seen to-day. Public meetings are held whenever notice 
is filed with the authorities, and speech is reasonably 
free. There is an antiquated press law, but it is not 
enforced. The day when journalists were compelled to 
send to the authorities printed proofs of what they had 



274 TROPICAL AMERICA 

written has passed. Arbitrary arrests for political 
offences have ceased in large measure. There is free 
access to the courts of justice. There are few glaring 
abuses of political administration. There is a deliber- 
ate effort to reconcile the people to Spanish rule, and to 
efface the terrible memories of a civil war conspicuous 
for atrocity. Police espionage is not what it was. Life 
and liberty are not dependent upon the caprices of the 
Captain-General. Slowly and laboriously the island 
has been making progress in its political and social 
conditions during the last decade. Cuba and Porto 
Rico are the remnant of a once mighty empire won by 
Spanish genius and courage. Spain is bent upon 
retaining the last stronghold. Revolution is to be 
averted by conciliatory administration and promises of 
political reform. In the march of progress Cuba is 
moving, not standing still. 

There is fulness of life in the Cuban capital, with 
exuberance of animal spirits and light-hearted gaiety. 
There are few careworn faces to be seen in the crowded 
streets, the busy arcades, and the spacious plazas. The 
cafds and restaurants are thronged day and night with 
a pleasure-loving, rollicking population. Around the 
shabby little statue of Isabella gathers nightly a motley 
concourse, joyous in mood and mercurial in temper, to 
listen to the feeble murmur of a Spanish band, to traffic 
in lottery tickets, and to laugh and chatter by the hour 
over frivolous jests. What Paris is to France, Havana 
is to Cuba. It is the centre of the island's life, activi- 
ties, and recreation. The times may be hard, but to the 
Lydian measures of their favorite city Cubans disport 
themselves with intensity of enjoyment. In Havana 
are the best club-houses, and play runs high in gilded 



THE EAST SPANISH STRONGHOLD 275 

gaming-houses. The city has the bustle of the daily 
movement of a population of 250,000, and under the 
glare of electric light it loses the aspect of faded grand- 
eur, and is again the most brilliant capital of Spanish 
America. There is more of genuine Spanish blood in 
Havana than in Buenos Ayres, Mexico, Santiago de 
Chili, Montevideo, or Lima. It has been estimated 
by Mr. Froude, that there are in Cuba alone ten times 
as many Spaniards as there are English and Scotch in 
all the West Indies. Cuba is essentially Spanish in 
blood, customs, vices, and pleasures. Whatever else 
the Spaniard may do, he never mopes; and Havana, 
with all the evils of misgovernment, and all the hard 
pressure of economic reverses, is cheery, bright, and 
overflowing with good-nature. 

Corrupt and incapable administration has always been 
a Spanish characteristic. Cuba has been reduced to its 
present extremities largely through the rapacity of the 
governing class in former years. If there has been a 
marked improvement during recent years, so that the 
Captain-General now aims to return to Spain only with 
what he has saved from his salary, and the burden of 
direct taxation has been decreased rather than increased, 
it is because the industrial resources of the island have 
been exhausted through old-time methods of plunder- 
ing the population and systematic violation of economic 
laws. The orange has been pressed dry; even Spanish 
administration does not attempt to squeeze the seeds 
remaining in the spongy pulp. For this reason sugar 
planters and tobacco farmers are now frank in admitting 
that the direct taxes on their land and industries are not 
unduly high. It is the burden of indirect taxation by 
which the cost of living is heavily increased, and the 



276 TKOPICAL AMERICA' 

exchangeable value of sugar and tobacco correspondingly 
reduced, that has been overwhelming this rich and fer- 
tile island with ruin. 

The country is impoverished ; the palaces of the nobles 
are deserted ; there has been an extraordinary shrinkage 
of real estate valuations; the treasury is exhausted 
with extravagant payments for an inefficient and cor- 
rupt civil service, and the interest on the war debt; 
and the municipalities are without means for ordinary 
public improvements and sanitary regulations. Havana 
is capable of becoming what Humboldt found it in his 
day — one of the most brilliant and imposing capitals 
of the world. The old city was built of enduring stone 
which has grown harder with the lapse of time. The 
cathedral, churches and public buildings were fash- 
ioned when severe and simple architecture, without 
meretricious ornamentation, was the requirement of 
classic taste in Spain. Even the great prison, which is 
the most prominent object from the harbor, is not with- 
out good lines. The newer portions of the town are 
well laid out with broad, shaded avenues, frequent 
squares and breathing places, and a spacious alameda. 
Even in its ruined estate when public grounds are neg- 
lected, street pavements in need of repair, and the whole 
town is fairly perishing for lack of fresh paint, poor, 
faded Havana has an air of distinction and even grand- 
eur. With good administration the city could be 
transformed in a decade. A canal constructed so as to 
let the tides into the back bay would flush out a harbor 
that is now a cesspool, and promote the healthfulness 
of the town. Moderate expenditures could repair the 
crumbling plaster of the public buildings, replace the 
broken lines of shade-trees in the avenues, and restore 



THE LAST SPANISH STRONGHOLD 277 

the brightness and glory of the Cuban capital. Havana 
now awaits, like a queen in tattered, patched, and 
soiled robes, the turn of the wheel which will reinvest 
her with the dignity of her prosperous days of power 
and wealth. So long as old-time Spanish administration 
continues in force, it is a lottery with blanks. 

Signs of exhaustion and impoverishment which are 
conspicuous in Havana are multiplied in Matanzas, 
where the decadence of a once prosperous and beautiful 
city is a melancholy spectacle. In its best estate it was 
a luxurious centre of wealth and fashion as well as of 
productive industry and commerce. Surrounded with 
sugar, coffee, and tobacco plantations, it ranked after 
Havana as the busiest hive in Cuba. All the indus- 
tries of the island were carried on with success on the 
verdant hillsides and undulating plains encircling its 
spacious and picturesque harbor. The Yumuri Valley 
was dotted with country-seats, where rich planters 
entertained their guests with generous hospitality. 
The San Carlos Paseo was blocked with carriages in 
the afternoon, and the evenings were filled with gaiety 
and sumptuous entertainment. All is now changed. 
Emancipation and the insurrection impoverished the 
rich planters. Many of the finest estates passed into 
the hands of Spanish immigrants and adventurers, who 
have been condemned to maintain an exhausting strug- 
gle against a system grounded upon violations of eco- 
nomic law. Planters who have escaped confiscation have 
witnessed the gradual slirinkage of the profits of their 
industries and the collapse of their fortunes. Depre- 
ciation of values is even greater in Matanzas than in 
Havana. Country seats which were conspicuous for 
elegance and social festivity are now bare, silent, and 



278 TROPICAL AMERICA 

falling into ruin. The San Carlos drive is a neglected 
and unfrequented road. Matanzas is a centre of unre- 
munerative commerce, a city haunted with memories of 
its former prosperity. The vivid sunlight lays bare 
mercilessly the faded glories of the town and the 
ravages of commercial ruin. By moonlight, one needs 
to be told of the neglected condition of these once 
famous drives and promenades, and the pathos of faded 
grandeur and exhausted fortunes makes only a transi- 
tory impression upon a sympathetic mind. San Seve- 
rino Castle and the ruined fortifications are enveloped 
with silvery radiance. The San Juan River, with its 
dingy lines of crumbling warehouses, is softened and 
transfigured. The broad bay, with its sparkling ship- 
ping lights, and the ocean beyond foaming upon a coral 
ledge, are vistas of singular beauty. 

Cuba was designed by nature to be the most beauti- 
ful garden, and the richest treasure-house, of the race 
dominating the industrial fortunes of North America. 
Nature proposed; man disposed. The island has been 
brought to the verge of economic ruin, from which com- 
mercial union with the American market opens the only 
way of escape. The purchase of Cuba either in Jeffer- 
son's or Buchanan's time would have retarded, possibly 
have paralyzed, the anti-slavery movement. It would 
have been a grave calamity for the United States, but 
it would have transformed the fortunes of the island. 
Cuba under American administration would have been 
to-day one of the richest and most prosperous countries 
of the world. Mountain-sides which within a few 
years have barely been scratched by mining engineers, 
would have been in a high state of development. For- 
ests which are now either trackless or the haunts of 



THE LAST SPANISH STKONGHOLD 279 

lawless marauders, would have been paying tribute to 
the commerce of nations. Coffee, sugar, and tobacco 
plantations, under intelligent supervision and with 
improved machinery, would have quadrupled in value. 
Yellow fever would have been stamped out by sanitary 
science, and the picturesque mountains of the south 
coast converted into popular winter resorts for northern 
invalids. Every industry of the island would have 
received an invigorating impulse. The past cannot be 
undone; but the future of Cuba is crowded with oppor- 
tunities and weighted with responsibilities for Ameri- 
cans. They have on their southern seaboard another 
California, which may neither be purchased, nor con- 
quered, nor stolen, yet may be linked indissolubly with 
the American market in the bonds of commercial union. 
If Cuban scenery be disappointing from nakedness of 
hillsides, and lack of variety in foliage and farming 
lands, it is not through any fault of nature. There is 
no other garden in the West Indies like this highly 
favored island. There is no defect either of climate or 
soil. It is human folly that is responsible for the 
meagre development of the agricultural resources of the 
island. Not even Southern California has a wider 
range of fruits than Cuba. There is a soil of varied 
qualities, and so rich that it onl}'- needs to be scratched 
with plough or hoe to be made to yield a hundred fold. 
There is an abundance of red earth, impregnated with 
iron, which is the natural bed for a coffee farm. There 
are broad levels of black soil, where sugar-cane will 
flourish as in no other quarter of the world. If the 
choicest lands for tobacco are of limited area, there are 
most extensive belts where leaf of fine color can be 
raised. Corn while growing to half-size can be made 



280 TROPICAL AMERICA 

to bear all the year. There are rice and cotton lands 
which can be cultivated on a large scale most produc- 
tively. The forests are rich, not only in mahogany, 
rosewood, ebony, and cedar, but also in dye-woods like 
fustian; and in the south and east the mountain 
ranges are stocked with iron and manganese. All 
these resources are made available by undulating 
plains, where railways can be cheaply built, and by a 
coast-line of 2000 miles bordered Avith capacious harbors. 

Four centuries have been rounded out since the dis- 
coveries of Columbus, yet Cuba to-day is one of the 
least developed countries of the New World. Out of 
a total area of 43,000 square miles barely more than 
one-tenth is under cultivation. At the western end of 
the island there is a population exceeding 1,000,000, 
but the remaining districts, of which Puerto Principe 
and Santiago are the capitals, are practically unsettled, 
having between them less than 500,000 whites, negroes, 
and Chinese. A transformation of administration and 
economic conditions is needed in order that there may 
be a new and reinvigorated Cuba. The Spanish com- 
v/ 1 mercial system has been like the wild Indian fig of the 

island entwining the monarch trees of the forest and 
paralyzing them with its serpentine embrace. The 
destroying fig must first be uprooted before the tree 
can have the soil, light, air, and moisture needed for 
its normal growth. 

The Spanish West Indies by retaining slavery for a 
generation after emancipation had been decreed in the 
British Islands, were enabled to obtain as marked an 
ascendency in the production of cane sugar as Brazil 
secured by forced labor in raising coffee for the markets 
of the world. While the British West Indies were 



THE LAST SPANISH STRONGHOLD 281 

struggling to find some substitute for the uncertain 
labor of emancipated slaves, the sugar industry of Cuba 
was making rapid progress. When Jamaica, Trinidad, 
and British Guiana, after experimenting unsuccess- 
fully with free colored laborers imported from Africa 
and other countries, finally obtained coolies from the 
East Indies, emancipation was proclaimed in Cuba 
under conditions which enabled the planters to adapt 
themselves to the change and to profit by the experi- 
ence of their rivals. Slavery, while it exposed the 
white population of Cuba to less apprehension than in 
the British West Indies, where the European descend- 
ants were hopelessly outnumbered by the blacks, con- 
fined the island practically to two industries, sugar and 
tobacco. Even tobacco had fallen to a subordinate and 
greatly inferior level. As slavery prevented diversifi- 
cation of industry in Brazil and the American Southern 
States, making coffee the chief staple in one, and cotton 
in the other, so also it left Cuba largely dependent 
upon sugar. This is the economic curse of slavery 
wherever it has existed, and the evil is greatest in the 
West Indies, because the cane industry has been sub- 
jected to the tremendous pressure of competition with 
beet sugar. Brazilian coffee and American cotton have 
continued under free labor to dominate the market of 
the world, but West Indian sugar has been displaced in 
Europe and can be sold to-day mainly in the United 
States. That is the last and only great market which 
is left for the chief staple of Cuba. The effect of tariff 
enactments by which Spain was protected at the ex- v 
pense of Cuba was to compel the island to buy its sup- 
plies in a dear market, where only a little of its sugar 
was sold, and thus to depreciate the purchasing power 



282 TROPICAL AMERICA 

of its chief staple. This extraordinary economic system 
was aptly compared by Consul-General Williams, in 
one of many talks with me, to a turbine wheel. The 
exports of Cuba went to the United States, but their 
purchasing power in exchange was diverted to Spain, 
which did not receive the initial impulse. 

Yankee shrewdness has been no match for Spanish 
guile during recent years of Cuban diplomacy. Never 
was one government more completely outwitted by 
another than the United States by Spain in the nego- 
tiations which led to the commercial agreement of 
1884. There had been a tariff war between the two 
countries, by which the shipping of each had been pro- 
tected by discriminating and retaliator}^ duties. Inas- 
much as higher imposts were levied in Cuban ports 
upon cargoes under the American flag, merchandise in 
Spanish bottoms was subjected in American ports to 
an ad valorem duty of ten per cent. The retaliatory 
duties were more prejudicial to the interests of Spanish 
than to those of American shipping, for the reason 
that the volume of the exports from Cuba greatly ex- 
ceeded that of the imports received in return from the 
United States. In order to rescue its shipping from 
these ruinous conditions, Spain succeeded in entrap- 
ping the United States into a commercial agreement for 
the equalization of the flags and the abolition of the 
discriminating duties on each side. 

In order to obtain admission for Cuban sugar into 
American ports under the Spanish flag, it was neces- 
sary to offer compensating advantages for American 
shipping in Cuban ports. This was nominally done by 
the removal of discriminating flag duties. But meas- 
ures were taken to neutralize this advantage by provid- 



THE LAST SPANISH STRONGHOLD 288 

ing for a gradual reduction of the import duties on 
breadstuffs and manufactures shipped from Spain. The 
commercial agreement was made on February 13, 1884, 
but the Spanish tariff act of July 20, 1882, had reduced 
to a minimum all the benefits which could be derived 
by the United States from the compact. This can 
readily be illustrated. Before the agreement was made, 
flour from Spain was subject in Cuba to a duty of 
$2.25 per 225 pounds when shipped under the Spanish 
flag. American flour in Spanish bottoms was liable to 
a duty of 14.69. On American flour in American bot- 
toms a duty of $5.51 was paid. The effect of the agree- 
ment of 1884 was to remove the discrimination between 
American and Spanish bottoms amounting to 82 cents. 
American flour still had against it a discrimination of 
$2.44; and, under the tariff law of 1882, this broad 
margin was to be widened every year by the reduction 
of duties on Spanish flour. This sliding scale of reduc- 
tions extended over a period of ten years. In this way 
the margin against American flour was increased from 
$2.44 year by year until it was $5.62 per barrel. The 
same methods of procedure were employed for the pro- 
tection of all classes of merchandise manufactured or 
produced in Spain. The flags were equalized, but the 
gradual reduction of duties on Spanish imports placed 
American imports in Cuba at greater disadvantage than 
in 1882, before the commercial agreement was made. 

Spain was playing a double game. While offering 
fictitious advantages, it was adopting a policy by which 
its commercial marine could be saved from destruction 
and developed at the expense of the only great maritime 
nation that was systematically neglecting and sacrific- 
ing its shipping interests. Spain by its economic and 



284 TROPICAL AMERICA 

commercial policy had driven every flag except its own 
and the American from Cuba. With discriminating 
duties in favor of Spanish products, no other European 
nation could profitably compete in the import trade ; and 
when there was no market for cane sugar on the conti- 
nent, there were no cargoes to take back. Americans 
took the sugar and apparently were indifferent to the 
development of their export and carrying trades. It 
was easy to dupe the great Yankee nation into a com- 
pact by which Spanish ships could carry sugar into New 
York and be admitted on terms of equality in the carry- 
ing trade, while American merchandise was to be dis- 
criminated against in Cuba more and more heavily by 
the operation of the reduced tariff on imports received 
from the Peninsula. Spain made a bargain by which 
its shipping interests could be restored without loss to 
its agricultural and manufacturing classes, and at once 
increased its subsidies and bounties to its merchant 
marine. The sugar-planters derived no benefit what- 
ever from discriminations against the exports of the 
only market where they could sell their product. 
They lost heavily by a tariff system which protected 
Spain at the expense of Cuba and compelled them 
to obtain exchanges in the dearest market. 

While the American tariff bill of 1890 was under dis- 
cussion, Spain decreed an increase of twenty per cent on 
imports in Cuba and Porto Rico from all ports except 
its own. This was done defiantly in expectation of 
increased duties on tobacco. It was the first response 
to the offer of a free market for sugar in the United 
States. It was not until the reciprocity amendment 
was adopted that the island's future was directly 
affected. That brought in American diplomacy to work 



THE LAST SPANISH STROKGHOLD 285 

out the economic emancipation of Cuba from Spain. 
Bitter experience had taught the island that alone and 
unaided it could do nothing. The disastrous insurrec- 
tion would never have broken out, if Cubans had not 
counted with false confidence upon American interven- 
tion. It ended in collapse, because the United States 
government, recoiling from civil war, would do nothing 
for the insurgents. The economic revolution by which 
the island's industrial fortunes might be restored could 
be brought about only with the cooperation of the 
United States. Havana was feeble, but Washington 
was powerful. The reciprocity amendment was the 
fulcrum for a long lever. Let sufficient force be applied 
by the Great Kepublic, and the world of Spanish diplo- 
macy might be moved. 

The lever was long enough and there was adequate 
force in Washington. The reciprocit}'- schedules were 
negotiated. Spain reluctantly consented to relax its 
economic system and to recognize the commercial de- 
pendency of the islands upon the United States. The 
Madrid government may not have been influenced by 
apprehension of political disturbances, but it must at 
least have dreaded an access of annexation feeling. In 
the Cuban revolt it had a powerful body of Spanish 
supporters with conservative instincts. The native 
landowners who were in sympathy with the insurrec- 
tion lost everything in the struggle. Their estates 
were confiscated and sold to Spaniards and foreigners. 
It is this new class of property-owners, reinforced by the 
old contingent of Spanish conservatives, that has been 
most directly interested in securing reciprocity. It is 
the ruling class, controlling what capital there is in the 
island, and its interests require unrestricted trade with 



286 TROPICAL AMERICA 

the only market where its produce can be sold. If reci- 
procity had been refused, a great impulse would inevi- 
tably have been imparted to the annexation movement; 
and if serious disturbances had arisen, the home govern- 
ment would have lacked the support of the most influ- 
ential classes. The risks were not taken. By granting 
the demand for reciprocity, the Madrid government 
adopted the most practical and the safest method of 
counteracting annexation agitation and of strengthen- 
ing the allegiance of the colonies to the Crown. The 
Northern Republic had been like a giant sleeping while 
the little men of Spanish Liliput had enmeshed him 
with the silken bonds of diplomacy. He suddenly 
awakened and had resources of power at his command 
which were irresistible. 

It was my fortune to be in Cuba while the commis- 
sion was in Madrid and to converse freely with the 
planters and merchants a few weeks before the reci- 
procity treatj^ was negotiated. I was astonished by the 
frankness with which a revolution was predicted as the 
result of a possible failure of the reciprocity negotia- 
tions. A summary of the opinion of the land proprie- 
tors and industrial classes would have taken this form: 
Cuba had been paralyzed and ruined by a system of 
unreciprocal protection adopted for the selfish interests 
of Spain ; the island must have the benefits of commer- 
cial union with the United States, the only market for 
its sugar; if the mother country persisted in refusing 
to negotiate an equitable reciprocity convention with 
the State Department, there would be intense excite- 
ment, bitter resentment, and a prospect of the outbreak 
of revolution ; and while compliance with the reasona- 
ble demands of the United States would stimulate a 



THE LAST SPANISH STRONGHOLD 287 

feeling of loyalty to Spain, Cuba belonged naturally in 
the orbit of the Northern Republic and sooner or later 
■would be drawn into its place by the law of economic 
gravitation. There was no division of opinion in the 
island respecting either the advantages of or the neces- 
sity for commercial union. 

The only planter who spoke to me in terms of dis- 
paragement of reciprocity was a rabid annexationist who 
apprehended that the success of the policy would post- 
pone for an indefinite period political union. He had 
no faith in it. Anything short of annexation would be 
futile. The sugar-planters were at the end of their 
resources. They could hot sell their estates, nor carry 
on business profitably, nor obtain trustworthy mechanics 
and skilled labor for so delicate and scientific an indus- 
try as sugar-making. The country was utterly ex- 
hausted. What was needed was American trade, 
capital, and labor; and these could only come after 
annexation. Cuba belonged in the Union. Nature 
intended it to be there. Economic law was carrying 
it in that direction. A financial collapse would accel- 
erate the movement. No, reciprocity was not a remedy. 
Annexation must come. So this worthy man ran on 
for an hour or more. He was the only planter, or mer- 
chant, who dissented from the general opinion that 
commercial union was the only policy open to the 
island. As an uncompromising annexationist, he was 
repelled rather than attracted by the policy of reci- 
procity. 

The Madrid government was reported at that time 
to be considering the expediency of imposing a direct 
export duty on sugar as soon as the American revenue 
duties were abolished in April, 1891. That would 



288 TROPICAL AMEHICA 

have been a direct challenge to the United States. If 
it were followed by the enforcement of the reciprocity 
amendment at Washington and the restoration of the 
sugar duties against Cuba, it was conceded by all 
planters whom I met that 1892 would be a critical year. 
A political revolution was generally predicted as the 
direct consequence of the failure of negotiations with 
the United States. Not once but many times was the 
assertion made by men of influence that the Madrid 
government seemed bent upon precipitating a second 
insurrection by rejecting the overtures for commercial 
union. At the same time there were others, perhaps 
equally well informed, who were confident that the 
horrors and sufferings of the civil war, recalled with 
shuddering fear and anguish of mind, would prevent 
the recurrence of a political outbreak and induce public 
apathy. Every one was ready to concede that commer- 
cial union would greatly diminish the cost of living 
and the burdens imposed upon industry, and strengthen 
the bonds uniting the colonies with the mother State. 

In every quarter I received testimony to the quiet, 
orderly, and peaceable character of the working popula- 
tion. The negroes were docile, easily controlled, and 
well disposed. During the insurrection the slaves were 
loyal to their masters. When the war ended, emanci- 
pation came as a reward for their good conduct. No 
feeling of race antipathy was excited. Whites and 
blacks adapted themselves at once to the new condi- 
tions. They may be seen to-day working side by side 
in the field or taking coffee together at a restaurant. 
The Spanish, being a Latin breed, have little of that 
strong feeling of affinity for their own blood, and of 
antipathy to a race of another color, that is characteris- 



THE LAST SPANISH STRONGHOLD 289 

tic of the Anglo-Saxon. There was neither jealousy 
nor persecution of the freedmen, as in the United States 
after the war. There was no corresponding feeling of 
resentment against the whites. 

These facts are significant, because the strongest 
argument against the annexation of Cuba before the 
Civil War in the United States was grounded upon the 
danger of increasing the area of slave population, and 
because also the inaction of the American government 
during the insurrection in the island was justified by 
the plea that the existence of turbulent and lawless 
classes there precluded intervention on its behalf. 
Emancipation has been wrought there with less race 
friction and disturbance than in the United States. In 
no other quarter of Spanish America is there less law- 
lessness than in Cuba. The strongest argument against 
the purchase or annexation of the island is the lack of 
congeniality and sympathy between the Latin race and 
the American Anglo-Saxons. They are as unlike as if 
they had been born and bred on different planets. 

The Cuban question is looming up in the future of 
the United States as one of steadily increasing impor- 
tance. Commercial union has satisfied, at least tem- 
porarily, all industrial classes and restored in some 
degree the prestige of Spain in the island. It has 
promoted investments of American capital and the 
development of the sugar industry on a large scale. 
With improved machinery and scientific processes it is 
not improbable that the production of sugar in Cuba 
will be doubled in a decade. The reductions of duties 
on American flour, provisions, manufactures, lumber, 
and coal will largely benefit consumers and industrial 
interests. If commercial union be followed by a revival 



290 TROPICAL AMERICA 

of business activity, as now seems probable, there will 
be no disturbance of the relations of political depend- 
ence upon the mother country, for Cuba with a restora- 
tion of its prosperity will be more loyal than ever before. 
If the reciprocity agreement fails to release the planters 
from their financial embarrassments, the force of eco- 
nomic gravitation toward the United States will become 
irresistible, and annexation will be the last resource of 
the island. Americans to-day are confident that they 
do not want Cuba on any terms. They are probably 
right, for the Anglo-Saxon and Latin civilizations do 
not accord with each other. But if in time the people 
of the island are found to be clamoring for admission 
into the Union, it may be very difficult to keep them 
out. Cuba is a storehouse of mineral and agricultural 
wealth. It was designed by nature to be the most pro- 
ductive garden of the tropics. The early Spanish nav- 
igators rightly named it the Pearl of the Antilles. It 
is a pearl clouded with industrial misfortunes. Under 
American administration it would be cleaned, reset, 
and polished, so as to shine with more than its old-time 
lustre. 



XV 

A CIRCUIT OF MEXICAN TOWNS 

RTJINED RACES AND PROSPEROUS INDUSTRIES OF YUCATAN 
— NEW HARBOR WORKS AT TAMPICO — VERA CRUZ IN 

WHITE CEREMENTS OLD-TIME SCENES IN ORIZABA 

PUEBLA AND CHOLULA THE MOST PROSAIC CAPITAL OF 

SPANISH AMERICA TOLUCA AND MORELIA — LAKE PATZ- 

CUARO AND TZINTZUNTZAN — AN INDIAN ART-IDOL IN 
A RUINED CHURCH — CONTRAST BETWEEN AGUAS CALI- 
ENTES AND SAN LUIS POTOSI — MONTEREY IN A TRAN- 
SITION STAGE 

The traveller who follows in the track of Cortes and 
the Conquistadores from Cuba catches his first glimpse 
of Mexico on the second morning after leaving Havana. 
The yellow sand dunes of Progreso passed under the 
eyes of the boldest and least scrupulous adventurer of 
the era of the conquest as he was sailing along the 
coast of Yucatan toward the Tabasco River. It is the 
same sunny but treacherous shore which is seen five 
miles away as the ship lies at anchor, rolling from side 
to side with the ground-swell. If the winds still blow 
and the sand-bars are shifting with every ebb of the 
tide, as they were four hundred years ago, so, too, there 
is little change in the lower currents of human exist- 
ence in Yucatan. The dark-skinned, coarse-haired, som- 
nolent Mayas were there when Cortes sailed the seas, 
and they are still to be seen lazily tilling the fields and 

291 



292 TEOPICAL AMERICA 

sunning themselves in the market-places. Four cen- 
turies ago their great cities were already in ruins, 
and their massive causeways and temples were over- 
grown with tropical verdure. They had been a superior 
race, with a genius for architecture, mechanical art, and 
engineering such as the overrated Aztecs never pos- 
sessed ; but they were in an advanced stage of intellect- 
ual decadence when the Conquistadores passed along 
the coast. They still form the mass of the population 
of the peninsula, and when one glances at their stolid 
faces he finds it hard to believe that there has been any 
material change in their social state or mental develop- 
ment. The workmen in the sisal fields, the hammock- 
makers in their huts, and the market-women dozing in 
their stalls live very much as their swarthy ancestors 
lived generations ago. Fruit, maize paste, beans, and 
green peppers form their diet. If a laborer can make 
thirty cents a day he is content. He is always in debt 
to his employer, and is never to be counted upon for 
serious occupation twenty-four hours after a feast-day. 
This is the character of the working population of 
Yucatan according to the testimony of experienced 
observers. Generations of Mayas have lived and died 
since the palaces of Palenque and the temples of Chi- 
chen were overthrown, but there has been no revival of 
the primitive prestige of a wonderful race. 

One must be just, however, in his estimate of Span- 
ish-American civilization. If there are in Yucatan and 
in adjacent States hundreds of thousands of the descend- 
ants of Mexican races, whose genius is attested by the 
elaborate stone structures unearthed during the recent 
years by archaeologists, it is because the conquest, with 
all its tyranny and merciless greed, left the natives in 



A CIRCUIT OF MEXICAN TOWNS 293 

possession of the coasts, fields, and forests. An Anglo- 
Saxon invasion would have swept them into the Pacific. 
The Indian tribes which witnessed the settlement of 
Jamestown, Manahatta, and Plymouth Rock have per- 
ished from the face of the earth. The Indians whom 
Cortes found in Yucatan and Mexico are still there, and 
it is their labor, unskilled and uncertain though it be, 
that makes the resources of the country available for the 
requirements of trade. If 4,000,000 out of 12,000,000, 
the estimated population of the country, are of pure 
Indian stock, the great mass of what remains, at least 
6,000,000, is of mixed blood ; and the upper strata of 
it have received the impress of Spanish civilization. It 
may not have imparted a progressive impulse to the 
Indian population, but it has not been a barren policy 
of extermination. The unmixed races remain, in their 
fallen estate, the most interesting ruins to be found in 
a land of ruins, but they have at least been left in pos- 
session of their mountains and forests. To these are 
added races of mixed blood, the bone and sinew of the 
population, upon which all hope for the future of Mexico 
must be grounded. Because the Spaniard does not have 
the same race affinities and antipathies which influence 
the Anglo-Saxon, there is a hybrid population that is 
capable of making social and political progress. 

Yucatan offers strong and almost startling contrasts 
between what is old and what is new in Mexican civili- 
zation. The memorials of its ancient architecture and 
industries are embedded in its forests, and the strain of 
the oldest native blood runs in the population ; but in 
its commercial activity and the development of its agri- 
cultural resources it. is essentially modern. Progreso is 
practically the only port, and it is the terminus of a 



294 TROPICAL AMERICA 

well-managed system of American railways, by which a 
crop of henequen fibre, valued in 1890 at over $5,000,000, 
is carried to the American market. On its long wharf 
are landed all the imports received in the State, and it 
is the shipping-point for raw fibre, the main product of 
the country. The railway runs for many miles through 
sisal plantations. All the way from Progreso to M^rida 
acres of fibre-producing cactus are seen. Yucatan is 
one of the most productive and prosperous Mexican 
States. If the working population remains in a low 
state of impoverishment and ignorance, the henequen 
or sisal farmers have what Sir Ambrose Shea is seeking 
to provide for the Bahamas, an industry preeminently 
adapted to the soil and climate. A great industry has 
been established, and Progreso has become one of the 
largest shipping-points in Mexico, rivalling Vera Cruz. 
M^rida, while founded as long ago as 1542, is not a for- 
lorn and crumbling town. The cathedral with its 
double towers fronting upon the plaza shows signs of 
age, but the houses are freshly painted, and offer a 
marked contrast to the dilapidated architecture of Cuban 
towns. The government buildings opposite the cathe- 
dral have double portales, graceful architectural lines, 
and an unmistakable Moorish effect. M^rida has a 
population of 50,000 and is a rich town. The henequen 
farmers live there in great comfort and spend money 
freely. At the carnival balls there is a lavish display 
of diamonds and Parisian costumes, and the planters 
and merchants often go abroad with their families to 
see the world. 

From Progreso the steamer Yucatan crossed the Gulf 
and anchored for three days off Tampico, where fresh 
evidences of the progressive tendencies of Mexico were 



A CIRCUIT OF MEXICAN TOWNS 295 

furnished in the harbor works. This town with a popu- 
lation of only 5000 aspires to be a commercial rival of 
Vera Cruz and Progreso. American enterprise and 
engineering skill have converted the worst into the best 
harbor on the coast. A sand-bar shifting with the 
breath of every norther has blocked the entrance to a 
broad and deep river with a channel adequate for the 
requirements of shipping of heavy draught. Work was 
begun in March, 1890, on a system of jetties similar to 
those constructed at the mouth of the Mississippi. The 
capital for this great enterprise is American, being sup- 
plied by the Mexican Central Railway Company, which 
opened direct communication with Tampico from San 
Luis Potosi in 1890. The Monterey and Gulf Railway 
will connect the town with Laredo and Eagle Pass, and 
the Interoceanic in time will approach it from the 
south. With these railway facilities and with a deep- 
water harbor secured through the construction of the 
jetties, Tampico will inevitably become a great com- 
mercial centre. 

Vera Cruz is making a belated and unscientific effort 
to improve its own harbor. A breakwater or mole is to 
be extended to the reef which now renders the entrance 
to its harbor very dangerous. There will be piers built 
on the inner side, so that vessels can take their cargoes 
from railway cars. The plan is very effective on paper, 
but conservative engineers predict that it will be a 
failure, since such a breakwater will not prevent the 
blocking of the harbor entrance with sand. Of the two 
rival engineering schemes, the Tampico jetty system is 
the more scientific and provides a practical method of 
scouring out the harbor. Vera Cruz, while it is labor- 
ing over its clumsy breakwater, will not admit that its 



296 TROPICAL AMERICA 

commercial supremacy is menaced by so insignificant a 
rival as Tampico. It is the natural gateway to the 
capital, and, moreover, has behind it the rich coffee 
districts of Cordova and Orizaba. These advantages 
are very great, but little Tampico is surrounded by 
mountain slopes, where coffee can be produced as readily 
as ixtle fibre on the higher plateau, and it is the natural 
shipping-point for the ores and metals of Central and 
Northern Mexico. Vera Cruz cannot afford to despise 
ambitious Tampico. The export trade of the three Gulf 
ports, Progreso, Tampico, and Vera Cruz, is largely 
with New York and New Orleans. Coffee and raw 
fibre are the chief exports, with silver ore, dyewoods, 
hides, rubber, sarsaparilla, and fruit in small quantities. 
Three-fourths of the surplus product of coffee is now 
sent to the American market and almost all the crude 
fibre. Two-thirds of the commerce of Vera Cruz is 
with the United States. 

An ill-omened city of the dead. Vera Cruz is ap- 
proached with a sinking of the heart, and even pictu- 
resque beauty is without power to restore courage and to 
disarm prejudice. Under the intense blue of a tropical 
sky the disreputable old town, with its blackened domes, 
its reeking fever-nests and its swarms of scavenger birds, 
is transfigured by rich mists of sunlight and revealed 
in spectral loveliness. Two majestic mountains, tower- 
ing above the cloud-girt Sierra Madre range, bend over 
it like guardian spirits. Grim San Juan de Ultia 
stands at the entrance of the harbor like a cemetery 
lodge. Landward is a vista of crumbling flat-roofed 
houses, cluttered like gravestones, with here and there, 
like monuments upreared, a church tower with china 
tiles, or a Moorish dome with time-stained face. Where 



A CIECUIT OF MEXICAN TOWNS 297 

the city ends in reaches of sand, palms and rank cactus 
growths stand out like ornamental shrubbery on the 
borders of a cemetery. Learned travellers stroke their 
beards and assert that the effect of the architecture is 
Egyptian. What they see is a Spanish city of the dead, 
with glittering crosses and monumental belfries point- 
ing heavenward, and with weird and ghastly effects of 
light and shadow such as are rarely known on sea or 
land. 

The two giant sentinels of the coast, the Cofre de 
Perote and Orizaba, are isolated mountains on the outer 
edge of the broad Mexican table-land. . Jalapa lies at 
the base of one and Cordova and Orizaba within a day's 
mule-ride of the other. These three cities are ap- 
proached from the coast through orange groves, planta- 
tions of coffee, sugar, and tobacco, and broad stretches 
of tropical forest. The foot of the range is reached by 
the English railway from Vera Cruz after sterile savan- 
nas and swamp lands have been passed. The vegeta- 
tion increases in luxuriance as the slopes are ascended; 
barrancas a thousand feet deep flank the line of the 
railway, and mountain torrents and cascades flash 
before the eye as the train winds around ravines and 
plunges from one tunnel into another. Almost from 
the base of the range the symmetrical peak of Orizaba 
with its snowy summit is seen, and every mile of the 
journey inland its proportions are enlarged and its 
splendors increased. A railway which makes less than 
three miles in a direct line while passing over twenty 
miles of zigzag and spiral curve cannot be anything but 
intensely interesting to sight-seers. The scenery by 
the Interoceanic, the new coast line to the capital, is 
described as equally fine, although the grades are easier 



298 TROPICAL AMERICA 

and the methods of construction much more economical. 
About 130,000,000 went into the English railway, owing 
to defective surveys for the enterprise. The original 
blunders have involved high operating expenses, which 
place it at a serious disadvantage in meeting competi- 
tion. 

What Orizaba was in Maximilian's time it remains to 
this day — a characteristic bit of old Mexico. With 
the railway station a mile away and with three lines of 
street cars restricted to short routes, it has not been 
despoiled of its picturesque quaintness by modern inno- 
vation. Railways and electric lights have come, but the 
antique simplicity of primitive customs remains. The 
market scenes might have been sketched by Bernal 
Diaz, the companion of Cortes, nearly four hundred 
years ago. The dark-skinned women at the fountains, 
filling their water jars ; the long, straggling lines of don- 
keys in the roadways ; the groups of peasants in tattered 
raiment with soles of leather bandaged to their feet, and 
grandiose hats on their heads, resplendent with silver 
cord and tinsel ornaments ; caballeros with silver stirrups 
and gorgeous saddles, and beggars by the wayside with 
black-eyed babies carried in deep pockets on their backs, 
are figures belonging to old Mexico which are disappear- 
ing from the central plateau and the northern border. 
In Orizaba they are in accord with the scenic surround- 
ings. The cowering beggar lying in a heap and mum- 
bling for alms is in the right place under the crumbling 
church tower. The meek burro is at home in the 
crooked lanes and deep defiles. The swarthy Indian 
faces, with black plaited hair and gleaming teeth, are 
appropriately framed by the rough casements in the 
adobe walls of the low-browed houses. 



A CIRCUIT OF MEXICAN TOWNS 299 

For variety of landscape effect and antique architect- 
ure, Orizaba is unrivalled in a picturesque realm. It 
lies in a verdant valley engirdled with bold hills which 
would rise to the dignity of mountains, if Orizaba were 
not close at hand with the tip of its white cone nearly 
18,000 feet above the sea, surpassed in height by Popo- 
catepetl beyond the plain of Puebla, but unique in its 
symmetry of form and majestic in its isolation. There 
are three rocky ravines with brooks of sufficient volume 
to turn the water-wheels of old-time factories. There 
is an alameda with noble trees and a bright little z6calo 
with a cluster of antique stone churches around it. 
Fountains are playing under orange trees, and stone 
benches are shadowed by the gorgeous tulipan. Every 
bridge spanning the foaming rivulets is an artistic 
study. Every angle of the crumbling military wall and 
every water-wheel among the rocks is an inviting target 
for the tourist's camera. The streets, winding in and 
out among the churches to the borders of the town, end 
in plantation roads with neatly trimmed hedges, white- 
washed cabins, and cultivated fields of coffee, sugar, and 
tobacco. The coffee shrubs are shaded with rows of 
bananas, but the sugar and tobacco have full exposure 
to the sun. The town is bordered on all sides with 
tropical verdure. 

While Orizaba is a remnant of old Mexico, it reveals 
the promise of the potency of progress. The antique 
churches contain paintings of real merit by native artists. 
American tourists are accustomed to saunter care- 
lessly through Mexican churches and to glance con- 
temptuously at the altar-pieces and sacristy panels as 
crude and ignorant work. There is much bad painting 
of the religious order, but the collection in the Gallery 



300 TROPICAL AMERICA 

of Fine Arts in Mexico contains not a few pictures of 
original force and fine coloring. Orizaba has had a 
native artist named Gabriel Barranco, who has enriched 
the churches with works of noble purpose, if of unequal 
execution. His Holy Family in the rambling church of 
San Jos^ de Gracia is an attempt to Mexicanize Naza- 
reth ; for the rug on the floor, the pottery on the shelf, 
and the tools on the carpenter's bench are all native 
wares. The expedient of nationalizing their work was 
adopted by all patriotic painters of the Middle Ages. 
This industrious Mexican, laboring in a remote moun- 
tain town, has felt the impulse of by-gone religious in- 
spiration and has given characteristic expression to the 
devotional life of his country. In like manner Felix 
Parra, in his noble painting of Las Casas in the 
National Gallery of Mexico, has shown that Mexican 
art has a present of positive achievement rather than a 
future of doubtful promise. 

Whoever founded Puebla had the instinct of a mod- 
ern sanitary engineer. The city stands on the easy 
slope of a hillside, and, unlike other Mexican towns of 
the first rank, is thoroughly drained. While the death- 
rate of the national capital is raised by drainage con- 
ducted under impossible conditions, the lakes being 
higher than the city, Puebla has all the advantages of a 
healthful site. It is one of the cleanest of cities. There 
are gangs of prisoners constantly employed in the road- 
ways, and police inspection is most thorough. The 
visitor who drives out to the fortifications oii the crests 
of Guadalupe and Loreto obtains an inspiring view of 
the city, with its undulating levels, its yellow, blue, 
pink, and white domes, its avenues of fir trees in the old 
Paseo, the brown, gray, and red fa9ades of the churches, 



A CIRCUIT OF MEXICAN TOWNS 301 

the fine lines of the tower of San Francisco, and the 
magnificent cathedral pile. Puebla, however, is not 
only a handsome town when seen from a distance under 
favorable conditions of light, but also when closely in- 
spected in detail. It is largely built of granite, and has 
many massive structures on its broad thoroughfares. It 
is a city of churches, hospitals, charitable institutions, 
colleges, and theatres. Glazed tiles are used not only in 
the church domes, to produce the effect of mosaics in the 
strong sunlight, but also in the business blocks and pub- 
lic hospitals, to break the cold uniformity of stone fagades. 
Wrought-iron work is also employed for ornamental 
effects, and there are signs of originality in the street 
architecture. The central square is one of the hand- 
somest in Mexico, and every afternoon and evening it 
is filled with promenaders while the band is plajdng. 
They listen with rapturous delight and intelligent ap- 
preciation. They have a strong preference for music by 
Mexican composers, which expresses their own joy in 
life, their excitable temperament, and volatile spirits. 
There is no other country in Spanish America where a 
distinct school of native composers has been created. 
The military bands in Brazil, the Argentine, and Chili 
play selections from French operas and Strauss's 
waltzes. In Mexico the largest proportion of the music 
is of native composition, consisting of military marches 
and waltzes of original movement and refinement of 
feeling. Some of the bands are exceedingly good, not- 
ably those of Puebla, Morelia, and Monterey. 

The cathedral of Puebla is undoubtedly the finest 
church in Spanish America. The cathedral in Mexico 
is larger, but the proportions are less symmetrical and 
the lines are inferior to those of this majestic pile ; and 



302 TROPICAL AMERICA 

as an interior it is not to be compared with the 
Puebla cathedral in richness of workmanship and sim- 
plicity of treatment. Two high towers surmount an 
impressive facade of stone, with basso-relievos in white 
marble. Built upon a stone terrace, it is of massive 
construction over 300 feet long and 100 wide, with 
a nave eighty feet high, crowned with a spacious 
dome. Other Spanish cathedrals are marred with mere- 
tricious ornamentation and tawdry decorations. Here 
every interior effect is rich and shapely. The pavement, 
instead of being floored as in the cathedral of Mexico, 
is of colored marbles. The entrance doors are mag- 
nificent samples of wood carving. The high altar is 
the costliest and incomparably the finest in Tropical 
America, being fashioned of onyx and many other Mexi- 
can marbles, and ornamented with bronzes and inlaid 
pictures. 

The transition from the noble cathedral to the 
pyramid mound of Cholula is a natural one, for it places 
the most finished product of Spanish-American civiliza- 
tion in comparison with one of the mighty works of the 
mysterious races who preceded the overrated Aztecs of 
the time of Cortes. It is approached by tram-car across 
the Atoyac Valley, a long ride of six or eight miles ; or 
it can be reached by the Interoceanic Railwa}-, which 
has a station at its base. The grass-grown pyramid 
mound is in the centre of a straggling Indian town, 
containing a plaza and as many as twenty old churches, 
some of which have been closed and practically aban- 
doned. What may have been, at the time of the Spanish 
Conquest, a pyramid with a truncated top, is now a steep 
terraced hill, with a road leading to the summit, which 
is crowned with a little chapel. The aspect of this 



A CIRCUIT OF MEXICAN TOWNS 303 

ancient mound has been so completely transformed by- 
Spanish embellishment and road-making, and by decades 
of vegetation, that it is now impossible to determine 
what were its original proportions. That it was of arti- 
ficial construction is evident from the fresh cut made 
at its base for the railway bed, adobe, brick, and frag- 
ments of limestone being plainly seen. If the mound- 
builders came from the North, they improved their oppor- 
tunity for education during their southern residence, for 
their architectural work in Mexico is vastly superior to 
the crude hummocks found in the Mississippi Valley 
and in the southwestern States. If they came from Cen- 
tral America and the Isthmus, they brought with them 
arts which flourished at a very early date in Peru. 

An American traveller entering Mexico with the pre- 
conception that he is visiting a country without apti- 
tude for making industrial progress only needs to visit 
the manufacturing cities of the table-land, Puebla and 
Leon, in order to have an increased feeling of respect 
for the people. Not only have agricultural industries 
of great importance been established, but nearly every- 
thing which the native population requires for clothing 
and every-day life is made on Mexican soil. The cot- 
ton mantas and shawls worn by the women, and the 
woollen blankets in which the men enwrap themselves, 
are of domestic manufacture. A coarse, unbleached 
cotton cloth, which is the only material used for cloth- 
ing by two-thirds of the population, is produced by as 
many as one hundred mills. Twenty-two of these cot- 
ton factories are in Puebla. There are also five woollen 
mills in the city, and factories for producing leather 
goods, hats of felt and straw, potteries, glassware, 
paper, matches, soap, and many other articles in com- 



304 TROPICAL AMERICA 

mon use. Puebla is also the centre of the onyx quar- 
ries, and tiles of various patterns are manufactured for 
building purposes. The peon and his wife are clad in 
homespun fabrics ; the manta, zarape, and reboso are of 
Mexican cotton or \yool ; the sandals on their feet and 
the gorgeous sombreros on their heads are of domestic 
manufacture ; they eat their maize cakes and beans 
from native pottery, and when they mount their mules 
to go to market they are in saddles of local production 
and at liberty to use a genuine Mexican spur. Else- 
where in Spanish America the markets are bazaars filled 
with European goods of the cheapest grades. Mexico 
has its own manual arts and domestic manufactures. 

The national capital is the most modern and prosaic 
city in Mexico. It lacks the strong coloring of charac- 
teristic costumes and the quaintness of old-time simplic- 
ity. There is the pulsating activity of a population of 
325,000 to be felt in its streets, but reminiscences and 
memorials of the storied past embalmed by the genius 
of Prescott will be searched for laboriously, if not in 
vain, outside the National Museum. The two volcanoes, 
irreverently called by Americans "Popo" and "Woman 
in White," instead of overhanging the historic lakes, are 
a long way off, and are seen to less advantage from the 
entrance to Dolores cemetery, or from the military 
school at Chapultepec, than from the plain of Puebla. 
The suburbs are not picturesque. The Viga Canal is a 
trench of nauseating stenches, and the chinampas or 
floating gardens are a flimsy humbug. The lakes are 
drainage cesspools, instead of being crystal sheets of 
water to reflect the intense blue of the Mexican sky. 
Chapultepec is a beautiful old castle, but the Paseo de 
la Reforma leading to it is grand only in design. The 



A CIRCUIT OF MEXICAN TOWNS 305 

approaches to the shrine of Guadalupe with the stone 
stations of the cross have been ruined by the railway 
tracks. With the single exception of the cathedral, 
there is nothing in the architecture of the city that is 
impressive. It is at once the most progressive and the 
most commonplace capital in Latin America. 

What Mexico really is can be told in the plainest 
prose. It ranks after Buenos Ayres and Eio de Janeiro 
as the third capital of Tropical America. It is well 
built, paved, and flagged, has a fine water supply, is 
lighted with electricity and gas, and has an excellent 
police. The streets are cleaner than those of any Amer- 
ican city. The pavements in such streets as San Fran- 
cisco, the Plateros, and Cinco de Mayo, are as smooth as 
a polished ball-room floor, and pleasure-grounds like the 
z6calo in front of the cathedral and the main Alameda 
are always in perfect order and as beautiful as Spanish 
landscape gardening can make them. Mexico has a 
most convenient system of street cars, by which every 
suburb can be directly approached, and a reformed 
method of numbering the avenues from a central point, 
by which order will finally be evolved out of the present 
confusing conditions of street nomenclature. The alti- 
tude of the city, about 7,500 feet above sea level, is 
trying to all who are not acclimated to it ; but the heat 
during the dry season is seldom oppressive, and the 
nights are invariably cool. During the rainy season the 
streets are often flooded, since the lakes, with one excep- 
tion, are higher than the city, and the drainage problem 
has continued to baffle the intelligence of the engineers. 
There are few theatres for so large a city, and the hotels 
and restaurants are utterly abominable. Mexico is in 
need of well-managed hotels, chop-houses, and steam 



306 TROPICAL AMERICA 

laundries. Until these wants are supplied, it will re- 
main a city where travellers are condemned to endure 
much discomfort and annoyance. My fortnight's stay 
in the city was fortunately timed so as to include the 
carnival ball at the Jocke}^ Club, an imposing ecclesi- 
astical funeral, and an impressive military parade. I 
saw Mexico at its best and was impressed with its pro- 
gressive tendencies. There is the bustle of increasing 
business in its streets ; there is the movement of intel- 
lectual forces in its daily life ; and there is an air of 
refinement and culture among its wealthiest classes. 

Among the sevent}^ churches of the capital there is 
one of unrivalled grandeur and another of superior 
sanctity in the estimation of the Mexicans. The cathe- 
di-al is over 400 feet long, 200 feet wide, with double 
towers of great height. With its majestic proportions 
and wealth of basso-relievos and statues, this could not 
be anything but an imposing structure ; but there is a 
lack of symmetry in the exterior design, with an inhar- 
monious mingling of incongruous architectural lines and 
types. The cathedral at Puebla is superior to it both 
within and without. I can say this with a feeling of 
confidence, because I have seen the cathedral of Mexico 
under the best possible conditions, when it was crowded 
with worshippers from the massive portals to the high 
altar at the funeral of Archbishop Labastida, and when 
it was deprived of its usual bare and cold aspect ; but 
the interior is deficient in richness of effect and warmth 
of coloring, and must be adjudged inferior to the cathe- 
dral of Puebla. 

The cluster of churches surrounding the miraculous 
spring and image at Guadalupe possesses few architect- 
ural merits, but the interiors are heavily weighted with 



A CIECUIT OF MEXICAN TOWNS 307 

gold and silver, and represent an outlay of millions of 
dollars. This is the Mexican Mecca, which has been 
visited in past generations by hundreds of thousands of 
pilgrims, who have knelt at the twelve stone stations. It 
still retains its preeminence as the favorite sanctuary of 
the patron saint of Mexico — Our Lady of Guadalupe. 
Incongruous is the dirty town of Guadalupe, with its 
pulque-drinking and lazy population sunning itself in the 
plaza within a few yards of the scenes of all these appear- 
ances of the Mystic Lady. Familiarity with ground con- 
secrated by heavenly visitations seems to have exerted a 
demoralizing effect upon the inhabitants. There is no 
meaner town, no population more degraded, than is to 
be seen here on holy ground, where emperors and beg- 
gars alike have prostrated themselves before the sta- 
tions of the cross. 

If the traveller be enthusiastic over the glories of 
that wonderful Aztec civilization which Cortes is re- 
puted to have found in the Valley of Mexico, two or 
three protracted morning hours in the National Museum 
will be needed in order to restore his impaired faculties. 
A thorough study of that remarkable collection of an- 
tiquities may convince him that the Aztecs belonged to 
the stone age, possessed only a crude mechanical art and 
no metallic tools, were without artistic instinct, and had 
neither a written language nor money nor manufactures. 
The real treasures of the collection, such as the Calendar 
Stone, the Sacrificial Stone, and the idol of Huitzilo- 
pochtli, probably are not Aztec relics at all, but the 
remnants of an earlier and higher civilization, which 
had been overthrown before Cortes landed in Mexico. 
It is in the National Museum that the visitor sees all 
that can honestly be seen of old Mexico. He may not 



308 TROPICAL AINIERICA 

be able to identify periods and races, but he will have 
at least a vague sense of sampling all the generations of 
primeval Mexico, and of condemning such art as they 
possessed as both coarse and hideous, and as offering no 
indication of a civilization much in advance of that of 
other cannibal savages. The National Museum, Art 
Gallery, and Library are three well-conducted institu- 
tions, which are thrown open to the public without 
charge for admission. These are the chief treasure- 
houses of Mexican archaeology, art, and literature, and 
the collections are of inestimable value for their edu- 
cational influences. The Museum has created rival 
schools of archaeology in Mexico. The Gallery, with 
its fine picture of Las Casas and other strong works, has 
imparted an impulse to national art. The immense 
library has only been partly explored, and contains 
material for a revised history of the country, which will 
settle many disputed points. These three magnificent 
collections are the crowning treasures of modern Aztec 
Land. 

The railway from the national capital to Toluca leads 
over the mountains and commands magnificent pros- 
pects not only of the Valley of Mexico and the snow- 
crowned volcanoes, but also of another majestic peak in 
the West, the Nevado de Toluca. Starting at a level 
of 7400 feet above the sea, the line crosses the divide 
beyond Salazar at an altitude of 10,635 feet and 
descends to a level of 8600 feet at Toluca. It is a 
railway ride of only forty -five miles, but there is not a 
dull mile among them. At Dos Rios, a fantastic 
swarm of Indian huts, there is a long bridge spanning 
a mountain stream, and then opens a succession of 
barrancas, or gorges, leading up to the summit at Sala- 



A CIRCUIT OF MEXICAN TOWNS 309 

zar. Everything in this wonderful panorama of rugged 
highland scenery is in accord, the wild, precipitous 
canons, the foaming water-courses, the town and ser- 
rated edges of the mountains, the bristling, sword-spiked 
magueys, the adobe huts, and the gypsy creatures traf- 
ficking in pulque and tortillas as the train halts at the 
stations in its circuitous and laborious passage. When 
the divide is crossed, there is another series of gorges, 
another mountain torrent is followed in its windings 
from the summit, and the magueys, the thatched Indian 
cabins, and the bundles of bright costumes are in keep- 
ing with the scenic surroundings. The stately Nevado 
de Toluca, rivalled in height only by Popocatepetl, 
Orizaba, and Ixtaccihautl, looms up from the valley of 
Salazar to make the last stage of the journey as im- 
pressive as the first. 

Toluca is one of the oldest Mexican cities, having been 
one of the strongholds of the Toltecs before the ascen- 
dency of the Aztecs was established in the great valley 
by the lakes ; but it is one of the most modern in its gen- 
eral appearance. It is the capital of the federal State 
of Mexico, and it has government palaces, buildings, 
and churches of recent construction and architectural 
pretensions. It has a college of excellent reputation 
and a spacious, well-conducted market. It has also a 
special brew of beer, which is sold everywhere in Mexico, 
and has added not a little to its contemporaneous fame. 
Toluca affects a jaunty, youthful air and does not care 
to be reminded of its ancient history. Its pride is cen- 
tred in its new institutions and buildings, and in the 
bustle, energy, and industrial activity displayed by its 
people. This affectation of newness does not enable it 
to dispense with two of the old-time abominations, a 
miracle-working image and a bull-ring. 



810 TROPICAL AMERICA 

Morelia has one of the few really impressive cathedrals 
in Mexico. The sacristy is very beautiful, and there is 
much fine carving in the choir. The towers are finely 
proportioned, and the effect of the exterior is symmetri- 
cal and imposing. There are several other handsome 
churches in the town, but this ranks among the most pre- 
tentious in Mexico. In general terms it is safe to affirm 
that, in excellence of architectural design and in richness 
of interior decoration, there are at least six churches in 
Mexico surpassing any cathedral in South America that 
can be named. There may, or may not, be more piety, 
but certainly there is better art. Another distinguish- 
ing characteristic of Morelia is its charming pleasure- 
grounds. In addition to the plazas on each side of the 
cathedral, there is an alameda at the eastern end of 
the town, where a long stone causeway, with broad para- 
pets and benches, is shaded with trees. This causeway 
is spanned by an aqueduct, and it is a delightful place 
for outdoor music. Since I have compared the eccle- 
siastical architecture of Mexico with that of South 
America, it may be well to add that with the exception 
of Rio de Janeiro and Santiago in Chili there are no 
cities in the far South possessing such artistic plazas and 
alamedas as are seen in Aztec land. Spanish regularity 
and landscape gardening have left their impress upon 
Mexican cities, but in "the aboriginal blood there must 
have been a strain of passion for decorative effect. 

From Morelia I made an excursion with one of the 
students of the college to Tzintzuntzan. The village 
was formerly inaccessible, but it is now readily reached 
from Patzcuaro, the terminus of the Morelia branch of 
the National Railway. From a picturesque hacienda, 
where a clean bed and delicious whitefish broiled to a 



A CIRCUIT OF MEXICAN TOWNS 311 

turn are to be had, a little steamer crosses the lake to 
Erangaricuaro, a curious Indian village, where barges 
are filled with lumber cut in the mountains near by. 
We started before seven in the morning with a double 
portion of delicious coffee from Ur4upam and two eggs ; 
for breakfast in the Indian fonda at Erangaricuaro would 
be delayed until two o'clock in the afternoon. The sun 
was hardly high enough above the eastern mountains to 
light up the weather-beaten face of the hospitable plan- 
tation-house, with its farm buildings and orderly kitchen 
garden ; but the lake was already revealed in the same 
bewitching loveliness which enchanted Humboldt, the 
wisest and least imaginative of travellers. There are 
larger lakes in Mexico, Chapala, near Guadalajara, be- 
ing three times as long ; but there is none to be com- 
pared with it in beauty. Lake Patzcuaro is well named, 
in the Tarascan tongue, the place of delights. It is 
encircled with mountains and sealed with flowering 
islands. Twenty-five miles in length by ten in breadth, 
it is a miniature Lake George at an altitude of 7000 
feet above the sea. Bold mountain peaks cleave the 
sky, with Tzirate towering afar in stately splendor and 
the treacherous volcano, Jorullo, looming up ominously 
in the south. The undulating banks are robed in ex- 
quisite freshness of verdure. The islands Xanicho, 
Xardcuaro and Pacanda, with their fishing hamlets, are 
mirrored in the waters with the clouds hanging over 
them ; and the visitor seems to see what he could not 
find in the lakes of the Valley of Mexico, the fabled 
floating gardens of Aztec days. Great swarms of wild 
duck are fluttering over the tranquil surface of the lake, 
undisturbed by the sportsman's rifle. It seems like a 
deserted lake, for there are no signs of life in the fishing 



312 TROPICAL AMERICA 

hamlets. The few Indians gliding noiselessly by with 
their rapt, impassive faces, in their primitive canoes, are 
ghosts of the Tarascan past rather than moving figures 
in the Mexico of to-day. The noisy, puffing little 
steamer, with its lumber barge, appears out of place on 
this tranquil sheet of water. It is a region which seems 
to belong to the dreamy reaches of a storied past. 

There was an empire, with Tzintziintzan as its capital, 
when Cortes invaded Mexico. From the Pacific to the 
frontiers of the Aztecs the Tarascan kings held sway. 
Their palaces were in the valley of Patzcuaro, on the 
shores of the lake and on the slopes of Tzirate. For- 
tresses were on the islands and paved roads, and tim- 
bered subterranean passages connected the cities. At 
Iguatzio there was an ancient pyramid. There were 
temples with hideous carved idols, and massive sepul- 
chres for Tarascan sovereigns. It was a peaceful race, 
but when attacked it was warlike and powerful, as the 
Aztecs learned to their cost. Cortes, when he had con- 
quered the great city beside the eastern lakes, sent, not 
an army, but missionaries to Tzintzuntzan, and they 
were received gladly. The idols were overthrown and 
the Tarascan King himself embraced Clmstianit3% Then 
came one of the atrocities of the Spanish Conquest. The 
King was burned at the stake for withholding treasures 
from a commission of covetous adventurers. The Ta- 
rascan chiefs were put to death with horrible torture, 
and the affirighted natives were scattered among the 
mountains of Lake Patzcuaro. This massacre caused 
indignation in the Spanish Court, and Quiroga was 
sent out to renew the faith of the natives in a religion 
which had been defiled by odious crimes. He was the 
first bishop of Michoaean, and he was consecrated at 



A ClRCtriT O^ MEXICAK TOWNS 313 

Tzintziintzan. He founded the first college in Mexico, 
and preached a gospel of love and good works, which 
won the hearts of the simple and docile Tarascans. 
Three centuries have passed since his death, but his 
memory is reverenced still by the Indian population in 
the fishing villages. The glory of the Tarascan empire 
has passed away, but not the gratitude of the race to 
the saintly man who taught them ways of pleasantness 
and peace. 

It is now eleven o'clock, and the two belfries of the 
ancient churches invite approach from the beach, A 
long lane leads up the slope of one of the two hills over 
which the adobe cabins are scattered. A throng of Ind- 
ians gaze at the visitors with indifferent interest at the 
landing, and a guide lazily consents to conduct the 
party to the churches. The houses are the rudest cells 
of sun-dried clay, and there are roses blooming over the 
doorways, and luxuriant vines have covered the crum- 
bling walls with fragrant verdure. One cabin is like 
another, for a spirit of equality prevails among this sim- 
ple-minded people, and no one is anxious to have a better 
house than his neighbor. There are pigs in the lanes, 
common red pottery in the cupboards, and for all the uni- 
form diet of maize-cakes and beans. Even in the rudest 
and most neglected dwelling there is some faint indica- 
tion of that love of decorative effect which is characteris- 
tic of the Mexican people. The municipal hall is in a 
sorry state of decay, but within there is a picture of the 
last Tarascan King's conversion to Christianity. Further 
on is the old wall surrounding the churches, and behind 
it there is a grove of olive trees, planted by the Francis- 
can clergy, who labored there more than three centuries 
ago. The cathedral seat was transferred even in Bishop 



314 TROPICAL AMERICA 

Quiroga's time ; the college was also shifted to Vallado- 
lid; the hospital was abandoned, and the church and 
cloister were left to fall into decay and ruin ; but the 
olive orchard remains fresh and beautiful above the 
graves where the pious Catholic missionaries were 
buried in the tangled garden of the convent. 

One thing more remains to match the beauty of these 
olive trees. The parish church is open, and Indians are 
kneeling in front of the most beautiful picture in Mexico. 
It hangs in the sacristy of the shabby little enclosure 
and is dimly lighted by a single square of white glass 
near the roof. It is a large panel representing the En- 
tombment of Christ, with the Virgin, Magdalen, Saint 
John, and seven other figures, one of whom is said to 
resemble Philip II. This is the picture which Titian is 
reported to have painted, and the King to have sent to 
Quiroga as a token of his personal regard. Whether the 
tradition be well authenticated or not, it is a noble work 
of art, worthy of any master. The strong drawing of 
the figures, the contrasted coloring of living and dead 
flesh, the artistic effects of grouping, the delicate bit of 
landscape in the background, and the profound study of 
light and shade are evidences that some master hand, 
whether Titian's or a pupil's, was laboriously employed 
on this canvas. Even in the dim light of the forlorn 
little chapel it shines and glows, a masterpiece of color- 
ing and composition, superior to any canvas in the great 
art gallery in Mexico. 

There is perhaps no experience which a sympathetic 
traveller can have in Mexico more suggestive than is 
offered by a glimpse of the interior of this parish 
church. The surroundings are bare and mean, the 
imaofes of Christ on the hioh altar are coarse and vul- 



A CIECUIT OF MEXICAN TOWNS 315 

gar, and both priests and people are ignorant and super- 
stitious ; yet incongruous as the effect seems, an art 
treasure is jealously guarded and worshipped almost as 
an idol by the impoverished population of this ruined 
village. Large sums have been offered both by Ameri- 
cans and by the ecclesiastical authorities in Mexico for 
this painting, but it cannot be purchased. The Taras- 
can worshippers at this forlorn shrine kneel beside the 
picture and offer the incense of simple-minded adora- 
tion to the dead Christ and to the living Mary, and in 
their rude, unlettered way appreciate that they have 
something almost divine that makes their temple glori- 
ous. Perhaps the little Indian women say their prayers 
and glance with their piercing black eyes at the pictured 
group, and then creep out of the cloister with a feeling 
that they have been nearer heaven. Certainly the tall 
Tarascan men follow a stranger into the church and 
stand around him while he is there very much as a cor- 
don of police surrounds a suspected pickpocket. The- 
natives are bent upon protecting their art treasure with 
aboriginal vigilance against the depredations of foreign 
invaders. It is the last remnant of the faded grandeur 
of their race, and they cling to it with passionate inten- 
sity of feeling. 

From Patzcuaro I turned northward, halting at Morelia 
for a few days, to be refreshed by a second glimpse of its 
fine Cathedral and lovely plazas, and journeying thence 
to Acdmbaro to renew acquaintance with an American 
friend, who had accompanied me from Havana to Vera 
Cruz, Orizaba, Puebla, and Mexico. The railway ride 
is a charming one all the way from Patzcuaro. Several 
villages of great antiquity are passed, and one of the 
finest haciendas to be seen in Mexico flashes into view. 



316 TROPICAL AMERICA 

There are entrancing vistas of Lake Cuitzeo, a broad sheet 
of water inferior only to Lake Patzcuaro in tranquil 
beauty and in the bold setting of surrounding highlands. 
Acd,mbaro lies in a beautiful valley with mountains 
sloping gently toward the lake. Here the main line of 
the Mexican National leading from the capital to Laredo 
is intercepted, and the returning traveller boxes the 
compass and sets his face in the direction of home. 

There was the promise of great progress when this 
straggling town attained to the dignity of a railway 
junction. A curious stone bridge built across the Lerma 
was an antiquated reminder of the importance of the 
village in earlier times, when it commanded the ap- 
proaches to Mexico from the Pacific coast. As the 
town had once been a centre of transit trade and indus- 
trial activity, there was ground for hoping that its fort- 
unes would revive in the new era of railway progress. 
Acdmbaro may have disappointed the expectations of 
railway projectors, but it is a quaint and picturesque 
halting-place for the traveller, who sees there not only 
Indian huts and dilapidated adobe houses, but also one 
of the oldest churches in Mexico. The parish church 
of San Francisco dates back to 1532, and has an interior 
which has escaped the reformatory ravages of restora- 
tion decorators. The miniature plaza, the churchyard, 
with its noble trees, a series of little chapels marking 
the stations of the cross, and the historic bridge offer 
characteristic glimpses of that old-time Mexico which 
the American tourist is always eager to see. Acdmbaro 
has also a representative population that occupies middle 
ground between the degradation of Indian villages and 
the social progress of the prosperous cities of Mexico. 
It is a convenient place for striking an average esti- 



A CIRCUIT OF MEXICAN TOWNS 317 

mate of the real condition of the country. It is con- 
servative almost to the point of sluggishness, but it is 
not a stationary population. There are signs of prog- 
ress even in the neglected streets. There are artistic 
touches in the surroundings of the adobe houses. A 
charm of manner and a grace of movement in the 
women favorably impress the visitor. 

Aguas Calientes and San Luis Potosi offer a striking 
contrast between what is stagnant and what is progres- 
sive in Mexican civilization. Each was founded in the 
century of the Spanish Conquest; but one has languished 
with a declining population and a spurious reputation 
as a watering-place, while the other has received the 
impulse of an invigorating industrial movement. Aguas 
Calientes is a watering-place without wealth, fashion, 
drives, or scenic attractions. It has a central square 
and a larger public garden, each ornamented with a 
fountain and parterres of coarse flowers ; but neither is 
well cared for, nor are there any bewildering effects of 
tropical trees and luxuriant vegetation. The town is 
built on the rocky centre of an arid plain, where neither 
vineyards nor verdure are to be seen. The streets are 
narrow and dingy; the churches and public buildings 
are mediocre; and the houses are low, whitewashed 
adobe structures, without glass in the windows or 
warmth of color. The alameda is a neglected roadway 
with a row of tall trees and a trench of tepid water. 
Morning and afternoon the laundry work of the town 
is carried on there, and hundreds of Indian hags are 
seen washing clothes in the trench and hanging them 
out to dry on bushes and rocks. It is this study from 
life which is the only novel and characteristic feature 
of the Mexican watering-place, unless the desiccated 



318 TROPICAL AMERICA 

monk in the crypt is to be added, the only catalogued 
attraction of Aguas Calientes for which I failed to look. 

The baths are excellent, whatever may be said of the 
wanton disregard of conventionalities displayed by the 
rollicking women outside. A hot- water bath is a 
wholesome thing for a travel-stained wanderer in 
Mexico, but it does not offer adequate compensation to 
the sightseer whose days are numbered in the land of 
the picturesque. Aguas Calientes with its hideous 
scrub-women and naked amphibians is hardly worth the 
attention of the traveller who is pressed for time. He 
will do better to hasten to Leon and Guanajuato, one 
a thriving manufacturing city and the other a quaint 
mining toAvn with picturesque and grotesque surround- 
ings, and not even to waste a day in this dilapidated 
and uninteresting town. Aguas Calientes seems to lie 
outside the range of the industrial movement which is 
transforming the face of Mexico. There is no stir of 
activity in its streets ; there are no new industries ; it 
is a centre of unremunerative agriculture; and its 
population is declining. With its ill-fed, shambling 
burros, its clumsy, antiquated carts, and its languid and 
unprogressive population, it represents old-time Mexico. 

San Luis Potosi has been considered in revolutionary 
times the most important strategic centre for military 
operations in Mexico. The railways have converted it 
into a commercial capital of the first rank. The Mexican 
National made it the centre of its trunk system from 
Laredo to the city of Mexico, building the handsomest 
stone railway station to be seen in the country. The 
Mexican Central, in opening a new port at Tampico, 
has constructed a branch line to the coast with San 
Luis Potosi as the core. It is a city with a population 



A CIKCtJIT OF MEXICAN TOWNS 819 

of 60,000, is growing rapidly and already pulsating with 
business activity. Substantially built and well laid out, 
with a spacious alameda and three handsome plazas 
close together, it has an imposing cathedral and many 
fine churches, a State capital, a public library, a museum, 
a mint, a college, hospitals, and many other notable 
structures. Adobe is already giving place to an ex- 
cellent building stone, which is found in the valley 
outside the city. New railway depots and other large 
buildings are in course of construction in every quarter 
of the town, and there is an unmistakable air of life, 
bustle, and enterprise in the streets. The stores are 
stocked with many classes of merchandise not seen in 
cities further south. There are fine displays of American 
manufactures and especially of agricultural implements 
and machinery. The city will profit largel}^ by the 
commercial development of Tampico, following the 
successful completion of the jetties. Coal, lumber, 
cotton, and iron, when exported on a large scale from 
the United States, will be brought to San Luis Potosi 
as a smelting and manufacturing centre. The new 
smelting works with facilities for the reduction of ores 
of all grades have created an industry which will largely 
increase the business of the city. Other manufacturing 
enterprises are already established, and the material 
prosperity of the town is apparent. He must be a dull 
observer who does not forecast the growing importance 
of this flourishing city in the Mexico of the future, 
which is destined to be vitalized with American energy. 
There are more Americans in Monterey than in any 
other Mexican city except the national capital. The 
stores are filled with Yankee notions, and the ware- 
houses with improved farm implements and mining 



320 TEOWCAL A^tERICA 

machinery. American capital is going into the largest 
of the three smelting works under construction, and the 
other two are under American management. The rail- 
ways have been built and are operated by Americans. 
The factories, which are employing a large share of the 
working population, are falling into American hands. 
The impulse which the industrial develojDment of north- 
ern Mexico has received since the completion of the 
leading railways, the National, International, and Cen- 
tral, has come from the impact of northern energy. 
Monterey is destined to become a great centre of manu- 
facturing and border trade, and to be identified more 
and more closely every year with the commercial and 
mining interests of the western States of the American 
Union. While losing its characteristics as a Mexican 
city, it is assimilating the elements of American enter- 
prise, energy, and progress. There are adequate com- 
pensations for the sacrifice of those picturesque effects 
of architecture and costumes which tourists from the 
North miss when they are seeing the sights of the town. 
Monterey must always, however, be a city worth visit- 
ing, for it commands a grand prospect of the Sierra 
Madre, and lies in the centre of a plain between two 
imposing mountains, Silla and Mitras. With an eleva- 
tion of 1800 feet above the sea, it has a fine, equable 
climate and all the conditions required for public health. 
As the Rio Grande is approached, signs of American 
influence are multiplied. At Aguas Calientes there is 
pie ; at Catorce the cream-jug is restored to its place in 
the domestic economy ; at Saltillo there are biscuits and 
griddle-cakes ; and at Monterey breakfast is served at 
half-past seven, with toast, steak, fried potatoes, and an 
omelet. To these dietary changes from Central Mex- 



A CIBCUIT OF MEXICAN TOWNS 321 

ico, where the heavens rain tortillas, and where frijoles 
and tomalis are gathered like manna in the dewy morn- 
ing, are added other tokens of contact and aiSliation 
with the northern race. The iron-pointed, crooked 
stick is replaced by the improved American plow. The 
clumsy carts with solid wheels have disappeared, and in 
their place are seen light farm wagons from the North. 
The saw-toothed sickle has gone out of use, and cradles, 
reapers, and threshing-machines of American manufact- 
ure are in the barns. In Monterey there is a marked 
reaction against the square, flat-roofed houses with gar- 
dens in the interior courts, and a gradual approach to 
American architecture. The roofs at least are begin- 
ning to tilt, and frame houses with piazzas are familiar 
objects. There is a large and influential northern col- 
ony, and it is changing the aspect of the city. English 
is spoken at every turn. The characteristic Mexican 
costumes are missed from the plaza. The fanciful 
names usually applied to Spanish-American shops as 
street signs are falling into disfavor, and storekeepers 
are venturing to put their own names in large gilt let- 
ters over their doors. The hotels are conducted on the 
American plan without any attempt at compromise. 
The most significant sign of all is the general suspen- 
sion of business on Sunday. In other Mexican cities 
the stores are open at all hours on that day, but in 
Monterey the iron gates are closed and the wooden 
shutters are in place. The band plays in the plaza 
afternoon and evening, and there is a bull-fight adver- 
tised. The Spanish spirit is still disclosed by the recre- 
ations of the city; but the old order of ideas, habits, 
and tendencies is passing away. The Americans have 
captured Monterey. 



322 TROPICAL AMERICA 

Laredo, El Paso, and Eagle Pass are border custom- 
houses and railway centres, and their commercial impor- 
tance is increasing every year. On each side of the 
Rio Grande at these points there are rambling towns 
bristling with energy. One seems to be on American 
soil long before he crosses the river. In Nuevo Laredo, 
where my circuit of the cities of the coast and table- 
land was rounded out, few characteristic Mexican 
faces and costumes are seen, and English is practically 
the only language. A visitor entering Mexico in quest 
of relics of the grossly overrated Aztec civilization, and 
preoccupied with premonitions of picturesque scenery, 
quaint costumes, and Saracenic and Renaissance archi- 
tecture, finds a country that is essentially modernized 
and quickened with progressive impulses. Long before 
he reaches the border, his interest in what is historic and 
musty is impaired, and progressive Mexico commands 
his undivided attention. Civilization is doing a great 
work in that benighted land, and Americans have a 
large and increasing share in it. Commercial union 
between the two great silver-producing countries of 
the world is the order of modern progress. That was 
what nature intended when the Rio Grande was made 
a shallow stream that could be easily bridged for inter- 
national railways, and the Mexican seaboards were left 
without harbors for the convenience of commerce. 



XVI 
FUTURE OF MEXICO 

THE AGRICULTUKAL INDUSTRIES — THE CACTUS PROCESSION 

— CONSERVATISM AND LABOR BLUNDERS OF AMERICAN 

DIPLOMACY AND TARIFF-MAKING — COMMERCIAL UNION 
BETWEEN SILVER - PRODUCING COUNTRIES — SIGNS OF 
PROGRESS A NEW ORDER OF INTELLECTUAL INDEPEND- 
ENCE 

In" making the circuit of the cities of Mexico I had 
travelled from Yucatan and the Gulf ports to the hot 
lands of the Pacific and thence northward to the border. 
Such a journey reveals all the important agricultural 
industries, and also the obstacles to be overcome before 
Mexico can be converted into a rich and prosperous 
farming country. The coast belts are narrow and 
uninhabitable, but on the slopes of the mountains on 
the Pacific side, as well as at Orizaba and Jalapa on 
the Gulf side, are coffee, sugar, and tobacco lands of 
the highest productiveness. There are regions of the 
greatest promise which practically have not been 
explored. At Cuernavaca, not fifty miles from the 
city of Mexico, sugar-cane grows remarkably well, and 
a short distance from Patzcuaro one of the best coffees 
of the world is produced, while Guadalajara is on the 
edge of the famous Colima hot lands ; but the railways 
stop at these outposts and long stretches of the most 
fertile hot lands of Mexico remain closed to agriculture 

323 



324 TROPICAL AMERICA 

and trade. From Cuernavaca it is a week's mule jour- 
ney over the mountains to Acapulco. From Guadala- 
jara to San Bias there is hardly anything more than a 
mule track, and to Colima and Manzanillo there is a 
week's journey by diligence, horse, and mule. From 
Patzcuaro to Colima there are no regular means of 
communication, although the Mexican National oper- 
ates a railway from the terminus to the coast, and has 
projected a line all the way. The ports on the Pacific 
are all desolate and ruined towns, languishing for the 
trade which railways only can supply. Coffee and 
sugar are carried down the mountains or into Patzcuaro 
and Guadalajara by mule. The West Coast coffee lands 
are virtually undeveloped. The railways must first be 
built, and then the richest agricultural belt of the 
Republic will be opened. Most of the processes for 
making sugar are of a primitive kind, and highly im- 
proved milling machinery is unknown. Wooden cylin- 
ders are still moved by horse-power; and the sugar 
is crystallized from the old-fashioned mud-pies. The 
large investment of capital required for successful culti- 
vation of cane prevents the development of this indus- 
try. Coffee raised in banana jungles is the best crop 
of the hot lands. The most remunerative agricultural 
export in the temperate zone is the fibre of the maguey. 
As soon as the cocoanut clumps and banana planta- 
tions of the Gulf seaboard have been passed the cactus 
procession opens, and it does not end until the hot 
lands of the opposite coast are reached. Nearly every 
species is to be found growing in grotesque form, from 
creeping stems and round balls bristling with spikes 
to columnar masses of prickly pear and organ cactus. 
The Turk's Cap, set with thorns, springs from crevices 



FUTUKE OF MEXICO 325 

of the rocks at great altitudes. Cereus Grandiflorus 
wastes the sweetness and glorious radiance of its short- 
lived bloom in deserted pastures. There are palisades 
of the tall, shapely organ cactus lining the railways, and 
there are ragged and loose-jointed hedges of mingled 
varieties for corralling cattle= In this motley throng 
the maguey, armed with its bristling sheath of sword- 
blades, forms the rank and file. All the way from 
Tehuantepec to the Rio Grande it is seen, now massed 
in cultivated fields of hundreds of acres, and again 
straggling in neglected wildness by the roadside, or 
on the rocky crests of inaccessible hills. So sluggish 
is its vital action that it grows and thrives where other 
forms of vegetation perish from sheer inanition. Stand- 
ing in stony places where the soil is thin and sterile, it 
repeats in silence the old Mosaic miracle of striking 
water from the heart of the rock. 

The Indian races used the maguey in many ways 
before the Conquest, and it is still one of their chief 
resources. It was the Toltec's wine and the Aztec's 
paper. It is the Mexican pulque, and it is one of the 
most useful fibres known to textile industry. From 
the refuse leaves a thatch is made with which the 
Indian huts are covered, and when there is no other 
fuel they serve to keep the pot boiling. The Aztec 
housewives went to the leaves of the maguey as to a 
needle-book or a work-basket in which to find pins, 
needles, and thread. The Indian women still use the 
thorns for pins and the longer spikes for needles, if 
they do not seek for thread in the fibre of the youngest 
plants. When the honey water is clarified with lime, 
boiled down into syrup, and crystallized after filtration, 
good raw sugar is made. As a valuable fibre-plant the 



326 TROPICAL AMERICA 

maguey is the basis of an industry which is steadily 
increasing in importance. It is still largely a manual 
process, satisfactory machines for dressing the fibre not 
having been introduced. The Indian women have the 
patience required for preparing it for market, and the 
Avork is mainly done in their huts. Superior dressing- 
machines will ultimately displace hand labor, and the 
production of ixtle fibre will then be greatly increased. 

While Mexico is generally reputed to be one of the 
richest agricultural countries on the continent, it pro- 
duces barely enough corn and beans to keep an impov- 
erished population alive. With tropical belts on the 
Gulf and Pacific coasts preeminently adapted for the 
cultivation of sugar and cotton, it has no surplus of 
either crop for export. There are no finer coffee lands 
in the world than the mountain slopes of Vera Cruz, 
Michoacan, Jalisco, Guerrero, and Oaxaca; but the 
product is inconsiderable in comparison with that of 
Brazil. With the exception of coffee, hides, and raw 
fibre, Mexico has only a small surplus of agricultural 
produce to send to the American market, which receives 
the bulk of the exports of the West Indies and South 
America. The inertia of its working population, com- 
bined with a deficient water supply and an unprogres- 
sive agrarian system, neutralizes the advantages of vast 
extent of territory, variety of natural products, and 
range of climate. 

There is no conservatism like that of the Mexican 
peons. They are accustomed to the old methods of agri- 
culture, and they will not depart from them. On the 
largest haciendas American plows have been introduced; 
but the laborers dislike them, and are constantly run- 
ning them against rocks and deliberately smashing them. 



FUTURE OF MEXICO 327 

Wherever farming is conducted on a small scale the 
ancient crooked-stick is used as a substitute for the 
plow. Sometimes the shorter fork is pointed with iron, 
but invariably there is a single handle. In Indian 
villages I saw ox -teams lashed to the longer stick by 
rawhide thongs fastened to their horns. The peons 
prefer their own implement, because they do not consider 
it necessary to do more than to scratch the earth when 
they raise their corn, beans, and peppers. Deep plow- 
ing in their estimation involves waste of energy in a 
land favored with perpetual spring, and where the 
maguey grows without cultivation in every hollow and 
on every hillside. 

The Mexican peasant has, in addition to his antiquated 
plow, a hoe and a sickle, each patterned after those 
used in Goshen under the Pharaohs. The hoe is pon- 
derous and clumsy, and looks like a huge rammer. The 
sickle has a full set of teeth in place of a sharp edge. 
With the hoe the rank growth of weeds is kept down, 
and irrigating trenches are opened and closed; and 
with the sickle small grains are harvested. Improved 
reapers and cultivators are never seen in Central Mexico 
except on a few large estates. Threshing machines 
have been sparingly introduced. The old-time method 
of driving mules around a ring, and having them thresh 
out the wheat with their heels, is retained. Corn is the 
staple food of the population, and it is husked by hand 
and ground with a roller upon a stone after it has been 
soaked in hot water and lime over night. The chief 
occupation of women of the lower classes is the prepara- 
tion of tortillas or maize cakes, the paste when ground 
by the roller being baked in a shallow pan over a slow 
fire. The farm vehicles are of primitive construction. 



328 TROPICAL AMERICA 

The wheels are solid sections cut from the trunks of 
trees with the pith punctured for the axle. The roads 
are so rough that any cart except a very heavy one with 
block wheels would be in imminent danger of dissolu- 
tion, and hence conservatism may have its use in the 
retention of the old-time mule and ox-carts to be seen 
everywhere on the table-land. Even when more modern 
vehicles are provided the wheels are of enormous cir- 
cumference. In the sugar districts ricks for carrying 
cane are mounted upon wheels large enough to move an 
obelisk. 

Mexico has tropical belts for the cultivation of 
tobacco, sugar, and coffee on a large scale and a broad 
plateau, which by reason of its altitude is practically an 
extension of the temperate zone into southern latitudes. 
Land alone will not make a country rich. There must 
be an abundant water supply ; there must be an enlight- 
ened agrarian system by which the number of self- 
interested cultivators can be increased year by year; 
and there must be an intelligent and industrious class 
of farming laborers. All these conditions are lacking 
in Mexico. 

In the elevated table-land forming nine-tenths of the 
arable territory the water supply is deficient. Mexican 
farms are largely dependent upon artificial irrigation for 
their productiveness. Water has to be collected and 
stored in reservoirs during the rainy season for distribu- 
tion during the dry season. In the temperate zone the 
possibilities of agricultural development are restricted 
by the resources for irrigation. The great haciendas in 
the interior are largely waste land owing to the imprac- 
ticability of obtaining a water supply for general agri- 
culture. This is the chief obstacle to the development 



FUTURE OF MEXICO 329 

of farming industries, and it is one whicli seems insu- 
perable since there are no large rivers, very few inland 
lakes, and tracts of forest land of limited extent. To 
this is added a system of land tenure and pauperized 
labor which offers the most unfavorable conditions for 
successful farming. The system of taxation has oper- 
ated in Mexico, as in Chili, to prevent the sale of land, 
the subdivision of great estates, and the creation of an 
industrious class of small farmers. There are a few 
very wealthy land-owners, but the mass of the popula^ 
tion is improvident and degraded. 

In the Argentine Confederation a horde of Spanish 
and Italian immigrants has been colonized in the inte- 
rior, and a great impulse has been imparted to the agri- 
cultural development of the country. In Mexico no 
inducements are offered to European settlers. The 
system of land tenure and taxation excludes immigra- 
tion. The peons remain the only class of farm laborers 
which can be employed; and while they have their 
virtues they are thoroughly untrustworthy and abso- 
lutely without ambition and thrift. Peonage is pro- 
hibited by law; but in all the Southern and Central 
States it exists as the only practicable method of con- 
trolling farm labor. It would be gross exaggeration to 
assert that a peon is still a slave, because he is in debt 
to his employer and compelled to discharge his obliga- 
tion as in the old days; but it is the common testimony 
of those who have dealings with this class of laborers, 
that it; is absolutely necessary to lend them money, and 
to keep them heavily in debt, in order to have work 
done with any approach to regularity and order. 

It would be difficult to find a more worthless class of 
farm laborers than was to be seen in such sections of 



330 TKOPICAL AMERICA 

Michoacan as I visited. The Indian is able to keep 
his family aliva on 35 cents a week, and this he can 
earn by working one day in seven. If he is willing to 
do more than this he has a small surplus available for 
pulque and gambling. If he earns little, he has few 
wants. He has shrewd practical sense, and is neither 
quarrelsome nor dishonest; but he is contented with 
his poverty and degradation, and has no desire to better 
his condition. This is the class of laborers upon which 
Mexican land-owners are dependent in sections remote 
from the border. He must be a very credulous traveller 
who can cross the plateau, mingling with the Indian 
population, and return with a conviction that a marvel- 
lous development of agricultural resources is possible 
within the next twenty-five or fifty years. In order to 
convert Mexico into a rich agricultural country a series 
of miracles needs to be wrought. Even if improved 
machinery can be introduced on a large scale, and the 
peons gradually educated and trained in industrial 
habits, as has already been done in some of the mining 
regions and in the Border States, the land tenure sys- 
tem cannot be changed without a political and social 
revolution; nor can the water supply be increased so 
as to be equal to the requirements of agricultural in- 
dustries competing with those of the United States. 
Americans can well afford to be generous in negotiating 
commercial treaties with Mexico. 

The three border custom-houses or international 
bridges have taken away a portion of the trade of Vera 
Cruz, but have not drawn upon the commerce of Pro- 
greso and the Pacific coast. Their gains mark substan- 
tially the increase of trade caused by the construction 
of railways in Mexico during the last fifteen years. 



FUTTJEE OF MEXICO 331 

The volume of foreign trade has expanded from 
$52,000,000 in 1873 to $101,000,000 in 1889. It is a 
large increase ; but it is not what it would have been if 
the reciprocity treaty negotiated by General Grant had 
been ratified by the United States Congress. That 
convention was made without solicitation from Mexico. 
The United States Congress appointed a commission, 
and authorized it to open negotiations for securing 
closer commercial relations with Mexico, A treaty was 
agreed upon and promptly ratified by Mexico. The 
United States after delaying action upon it for several 
years rejected it. Mexico was left in the humiliating 
position of a reluctant guest, who, upon being impor- 
tuned to go to a feast, accepts the hospitality with little 
appetite, and then finds the table bare and the door 
slammed in his face. It was not difficult for English 
and German residents to convince the mercantile and 
governing classes, that the powerful nation which had 
dictated, after a war of conquest, the humiliating treaty 
of Guadalupe-Hidalgo was bent upon maintaining a 
selfish and unfriendly policy. 

The rejection of the treaty of 1888 was a gross blunder 
on the part of the United States. Veteran whist players 
are apt to believe that the cards never forgive a misplay. 
Certainly it was neither generous nor wise to repudiate 
an equitable commercial agreement which would have 
been highly beneficial to the productive interests of both 
countries, and to do it, moreover, in such a way as to 
cause resentment and intense irritation, since Mexico 
was brusquely told that it was a poor country whose 
trade was not worth having. Recently fluxing ores 
have been practically excluded from the United States 
by a treasury ruling and the Tariff Act of 1890. 



332 TEOPIOAL AMERICA 

When the Grant-Romero convention was negotiated 
the exportation of these ores was insignificant. In the 
course of a few years the valuation of these exported 
ores ran up to $7,000,000. Without commercial union 
American capital had been heavily invested in Mexican 
mines, an advantageous trade had sprung up on each 
side of the border, and ores were going north to smelt- 
ing centres and live stock in the other direction. The 
exclusion of the low-grade ores involved retaliation on 
the part of Mexico. The duties on American hogs and 
cattle were heavily increased at the border. This was 
followed by similar action at Washington in the live- 
stock schedules of the Tariff Act of 1890. The general 
effects of this tariff war on the border were an increase 
in the cost of beef and pork in Mexico, the establishment 
of the smelting industry on a large scale in Monterey 
and San Luis Potosi, and the interruption of interna- 
tional trade by which American railways, smelting 
works, and farms had been greatly benefited. 

While this policy was deeply resented by intelligent 
Mexicans at the outset, as an indication of unfriendli- 
ness and hostility, it was not long before they were 
laughing at Americans for having over-reached them- 
selves. The increased duties on live stock added 
largely to the Mexican revenues, and this naturally 
gratified the governing classes ; but the construction of 
smelting works in railway centres near the mining dis- 
tricts, and the establishment of a great industry with 
American capital, were justly considered to be a national 
gain. The view which was generally expressed to me 
by the treasury officials in Mexico, with whom I talked, 
was that Americans had sought to injure the neighbor- 
ing Republic, but had only succeeded in hurting them- 



FUTURE OF MEXICO 338 

selves. When I reminded them of the removal of the 
duties on raw fibre, one of the chief exports of the coun- 
try, they explained it as an unintentional act of friend- 
liness on the part of the American Congress. This was 
an apt illustration of the folly of giving away the privi- 
leges of a great market. In the Grant-Romero treaty 
this was one of the most important concessions made to 
Mexico. When it was flung away in the Tariff Act 
of 1890, without any attempt to obtain any compensat- 
ing advantages, the favor was not appreciated. Mexico 
was not grateful for the free market for fibre, but loudly 
complained of the treasury ruling relating to low-grade 
ores. The long free list including coffee, hides, fibre, 
sugar, rubber, dyewoods, high-grade ores, and nearly 
every other important export, was not regarded as an 
indication of comity and good-will. The short dutia- 
ble list comprising lead ores, oranges, tobacco, and 
wool was magnified into a national grievance. There 
could not be a more striking illustration of the neces- 
sity of employing treaty-makers rather than tariff- 
makers to adjust the commercial relations of the two 
countries. Let a tariff be enacted, and the United 
States is riot credited with generosity in enlarging the 
free market for Mexican produce, but is only charged 
with hostility in excluding low-grade ores. Let a bar- 
gain be struck in a reciprocity convention, and there 
will be a different feeling. Commercial privileges 
which are purchased with compensating favors in return 
will be appreciated, and the two countries which are 
linked together by their railway systems will be brought 
into more harmonious relations. 

It is the deliberate judgment of all intelligent Ameri- 
cans in Mexico, that the United States can afford to 



334 TROPICAL AMEEICA 

deal with that country on the broadest terms in reci- 
procity negotiations. The Aldrich Amendment to the 
Tariff Act has offered only a narrow margin for com- 
mercial union, since sugar is not exported from Mexico, 
and the surplus of coffee is not very large and can be 
sold in Europe. If raw fibre had been included in the 
reciprocity amendment the margin for diplomatic action 
would have been greatly increased. The true policy of 
the United States is to obtain what compensations it 
can for the free market already opened for Mexican 
exports, and in a new treaty to enlarge it in proportion 
to the willingness of the Southern Republic to make 
concessions to the export trade. With thousands of 
Americans swarming across the border, and actively 
developing the resources of Mexico, every commercial 
concession that is made by treaty will 3-ield large 
results in trade. On the other hand, the Diaz Gov- 
ernment is directly interested in a policy which will 
attract foreign capital, develop national resources, and 
promote the prosperity of the railways which it has 
heavily subsidized. In 1879 there were 372 miles of 
railway; in 1891 there were 5555 -miles in operation 
and 1740 miles under construction. For thirty years 
charters were granted and nothing was done. Then 
American capital and energy were employed and great 
results were accomplished. In the course of a few years 
subsidies were authorized to the extent of $200,000,000, 
and when it became necessary to suspend them all 
the companies were financially embarrassed. With the 
funding of obligations in long-term bonds, and the 
resumption of subsidy payments on those railways 
which were practical enterprises, there has been a marked 
improvement in the system. The Mexican govern- 



FUTURE OF MEXICO 335 

ment is directly interested in the success of these subsi- 
dized railways, and commercial union with the United 
States will alone insure their prosperity. 

Mexican prejudice against Americans is still a 
strong popular feeling, but it is declining. Some of 
the newspapers take advantage of every petty incident 
to inflame the resentments of their readers. If a man 
be run over and killed on the railways, a ferocious 
tirade will appear in a San Luis Potosi journal against 
the management. The local magnate, the jefe politico, 
will be called upon to imprison the engineer and the 
conductor, and to stop the running of trains. When- 
ever an accident occurs there are clamors from the press, 
and sometimes an arbitrary exercise of authority by the 
State government. Even greater irritation is shown 
when some fancied slight is put upon Mexican officials. 
There are journalists and officials whose stock in trade 
is prejudice against Americans. So far as they consider 
it safe to criticise the Liberal government of the day, 
they inveigh against the concessions made to American 
railways, mining companies, and merchants. They 
delight in harassing and embarrassing American inter- 
ests. Narrow-minded officials are quick to take advan- 
tage of every opportunity for imprisoning Americans 
for debt under State laws, although under the Federal 
statutes this is an illegal process. Their political cry 
is " Mexico for the Mexicans," and there are reaction- 
ary and conservative classes which are in sympathy 
with anti-American agitation. 

Naturally these newspaper raids and official persecu- 
tions are resented by Americans of high spirit. The 
fact that many investments have not been highly re- 
munerative, and that the railway corporations have had 



336 TROPICAL AMERICA 

a hard struggle, even with the treasury subsidies in 
their favor, to keep the earnings on a level with the 
expenditures, does not predispose managers and super- 
intendents to accept affronts with meekness. Their 
relations with the jefe politico are often strained, and 
when they pronounce judgment upon the Mexican politi- 
cal system, it is not in complimentary terms. Not in- 
frequently during my journey from Ac^mbaro to Aguas 
Calientes, San Luis Potosi and the Rio Grande, I heard 
influential Americans deliberately express the conviction 
that the downfall of Maximilian was a grave misfortune 
to the country, since it deprived the people of a strong 
and stable government. This was a vagary as extrava- 
gant as any of the heated tirades of the Mexican press 
against Americans. 

The truth lies between these extremes of discontent 
with existing conditions of progress. The construction 
of the railways and the investment of $300,000,000 of 
American capital in Mexican mines, ranches, and enter- 
prises of all kinds, have created a strong and stable gov- 
ernment and opened a new era of industrial development. 
Value has been imparted both to the agricultural staples 
and to the minei-al resources by rapid transit for freight, 
and improved machinery. Not only have the shipments 
of ixtle and other fibres quadrupled in volume since the 
opening of the trunk railways, but all kinds of farm 
produce in the main plateau have become marketable. 
The mines have largely increased in value, and timber 
regions in the south which had not been explored have 
been opened. One of the most beneficial changes is that 
wrought in the condition of labor, especially in the 
northern sections. The old system of semi-servitude 
for debt is disappearing in the Border States. Work- 



FUTURE OF MEXICO 337 

men are paid by the day or week at most of the northern 
ranches and mines. With the abolition of degrading 
methods of debt-slavery, there is less improvidence and 
ignorance among working people near the border. It 
is an indication of the approaching amelioration of the 
condition of the Indian population throughout Mexico. 
Light is slowly dawning in a benighted land. 

No American can return to the Rio Grande from 
Mexico without being impressed with the results of the 
last decade of railway construction, industrial develop- 
ment, and material progress. The country is passing 
through an era of social and political evolution. The 
organization of an effective telegraph and railway ser- 
vice has promoted the supreme interests of peace and 
stable government. When the earliest rumors of local 
discontent and politician intrigue are flashed to the 
national capital there are facilities for transporting a 
large military force by railway to remote States. The 
supremacy of the federal government has been estab- 
lished. Insurrections have ceased. There has been a 
revival of national pride and public spirit. President 
Diaz, judged by rigid standards, is a military dictator 
rather than a constitutional reformer ; but he has gov- 
erned Mexico with an enlightened mind, as well as with 
a strong arm. Under his administration there have 
been large expenditures for schools and public works, a 
restoration of financial credit, with a marked increase in 
federal income from $16,000,000 in 1873, to $32,000,000 
in 1889, and a vast expansion of mining interests and 
mercantile business. The political power of the clergy 
has been rigorously restrained, education has been secu- 
larized, and brought within the reach of an impoverished 
population, and the lives of citizens and foreigners alike 
have been secured by adequate safeguards. 



338 TEOPICAL AMERICA 

The government of Mexico is oligarchical and mili- 
tary, rather than republican. There is no such thing 
as a popular election. There are no public meetings, 
the press is not at liberty to discuss national questions 
without restraint, and political parties do not exercise 
their normal functions in supporting or opposing the 
Government of the day. There is no registration of 
voters, the ballot-boxes are controlled by those in 
authority, and both State and National administra- 
tions are conducted by military men with an army of 
35,000 or possibly 45,000 men behind them. In prac- 
tice it is military government under the guise of consti- 
tutional republicanism. Few citizens take any interest 
in elections or congressional debates. Public opinion 
may be defined with a fair degree of accuracy as the 
policy which President Diaz considers expedient and 
necessary. Anything like opposition to his wishes 
is stamped out. This is not republican government ; 
but with the inertia of millions of ignorant and fanati- 
cal Indian peons to be overcome, it is probably the best 
administration that is practicable at present. When a 
Mexican Liberal is frank, he will state the case in this 
way : " There must be a strong military government, or 
there will be anarchy; the administration of the day 
must prevent the organization of a successful opposi- 
tion party and perpetuate its own power, for otherwise 
a degraded population, under the control of the clergy, 
would inevitably bring on a revolution, if it were 
allowed to participate in public discussions." 

Theoretically, the existing government must be con- 
demned as contrary to the genius of republican institu- 
tions ; but practically it is not without its merits and 
compensations. Civil war is at an end. There are 



FUTURE OF MEXICO 339 

few revolutionary intrigues and cabals. Brigandage 
and robbery have been suppressed, or at least confined 
to remote and inaccessible sections of the country. 
Military guards have been suspended on nearly all the 
railways ; treasure caravans and paymasters in the min- 
ing regions no longer require protection ; and haciendas 
have ceased to be fortresses of defence against maraud- 
ers. National credit has steadily improved, and liberal 
grants are made for public works and free schools. 
Above all there is no departure from that rigorous sys- 
tem of nationalizing the Church, and of emancipating 
the people from ecclesiastical domination which was 
resolutely introduced by Juarez, one of the greatest of 
modern Mexicans. American residents who lament the 
downfall of Maximilian as a national misfortune have 
as little real knowledge of the currents of progress as 
seagulls have of the physical tendencies of the Gulf 
Stream. Maximilian represented ecclesiastical reaction 
and national stagnation. 

Under Spanish domination there was neither higher 
nor lower education in Mexico outside ecclesiastical 
schools, and in these very little that was of practi- 
cal utility was allowed to be taught. During the last 
twenty years great progress has been made in popular 
education. Free schools have been opened in every 
town of any importance, and these have been released 
from ecclesiastical control. The Church, at the same 
time, has displayed marked energy in enlarging its edu- 
cational facilities. There are probably 475,000 pupils in 
the primary schools supported by the Nation, States, and 
municipalities ; and there are, perhaps, 240,000 more in 
church and charity schools. With a total population of 
12,000,000 this is far from being a satisfactory exhibit ; 



340 TROPICAL AMERICA 

but it marks a great advance upon the condition of 
illiteracy prevailing ten years ago. The school appro- 
priations aggregate 12,000,000 a year, and are steadily 
increasing. The administration of President Diaz has 
been identified with this educational policy. The coun- 
try is not stagnating as it was for twenty years after 
the war with the United States. Slowly and labori- 
ously the mixed races in the towns and villages will be 
taught to read and to think for themselves. Then the 
pure Indian stock will be rescued from its appalling 
ignorance. It is in the direction of popular education 
that progress unerringly lies in Mexico no less than in 
Brazil. Juarez and Diaz have created a new order of in- 
tellectual independence. In subordinating the Church 
to the State, and in restoring to the nation resources of 
wealth which were unproductive, they have armed the 
clergy with religious influence, and vastly increased its 
working power. Even with two-thirds of its useless 
and antiquated buildings secularized or abandoned, 
and with estates and properties valued as high as 
1300,000,000 confiscated, the Church to-day in Mexico 
is vitalized with an energy that was unknown twenty- 
five years ago. Liberal Government has not paralyzed 
it. Juarez and Diaz have reinvigorated it. 



XVII 
THE MOSQUITO RESERVATION 

A REGION OF ANOMALIES — MORAVIAN MISSIONS IN BLUE- 
FIELDS THE MOSQUITO CROWN CAPTURED BY A YANKEE 

NEGRO RULE AND NICARAGUAN AMBITION — VOYAGE 

WITH A CARIB PILOT THE CORAL CAYS AND MONKEY 

POINT A DEAD CALM IN THE CARIBBEAN A DIET OF 

YOUNG COCOANUTS 

The Mosquito Reservation is a region of anomalies. 
Bluefields lies on the twelfth parallel from the equator, 
yet is delightfully cool and has an equable and invig- 
orating climate. It is on the track of one of the famous 
voyages of Columbus, and consequently is one of the 
oldest sections of Spanish America ; but English is al- 
most the only language spoken, there is not a Catholic 
church in the town, and there are no adobe houses with 
flat roofs and enclosed gardens. It is the centre of an 
Indian reservation ; but blacks are the ruling class, and 
administer laws which they themselves have made. It 
is in the heart of Spanish America, yet it is under the 
religious influence of the Moravian Church, and is gov- 
erned by the bluest of Sunday laws. A series of sur- 
prises awaits the traveller arriving at Bluefields. It is 
a miniature Kingston, with a background of trackless 
forest, tenanted by intemperate Indian wards. There 
is a straggling line of frame sheds on stilts seven miles 
from a high bluff at the entrance of a long, shallow 

341 



342 TROPICAL AMERICA 

lagoon. There are pitched roofs, some of them thatched 
and others of shingles and iron; and there are low 
piazzas and unregenerate pioneer house-fronts flanking 
the stony lane where negro saints tramp along singing 
" Jordan am a hard road to trabble." From the knoll 
where the Moravian buildings are clustered this valley 
winds along the shore to picturesque heights with 
clumps of cocoanut-trees ; and midway there is another 
lane leading to the court-house and jail and to the edge 
of the forest. Along these neglected roads there are 
negro cabins and Yankee stores, but not a trace of 
Spanish architecture is to be seen. There is an Indian 
chief who is the nominal head of the government, but 
the negro rules, collects the taxes, enforces law, sits in 
judgment when white sinners offend, and calls the In- 
dian to repentance. 

Something like a series of anomalies was needed in 
order to restore my interest in Spanish America when I 
arrived at Bluefields. From the Mexican border I 
went to New Orleans whence I was doomed to have a 
tedious and uncomfortable voyage on a fruiting steamer 
bound for the Caribbean. After leaving the jetties, the 
Grussie headed for Cape San Antonio, and passing the 
light on the third evening, encountered high seas and 
rolled heavily. In the forenoon there was a loud swish 
of steam and the engine stopped. A crack seven feet 
long had opened in the boiler. For twenty-four hours 
the ship wallowed in the trough of the sea, with fires 
extinguished, without steerage way, and at the mercy 
of a high wind and a heavy swell. During the long 
watches of a sleepless night I listened to the shrill out- 
cries of a Spanish woman, whenever there was a deep 
lurch seaward, and to the ceaseless cannonade of chairs 



THE MOSQUITO BESERVATION 343 

and sofas bowling against the cabin doors. When the 
engineers had completed the repairs steam could only 
be carried at low pressure, and the vessel reached the 
bluff at Bluefields two days behind time. The first 
announcement from the customs boat was that there 
would be no steam communication with Greytown for 
fourteen days. As a day rather than a fortnight had 
been reserved for the port, this was a most depressing 
welcome. I was back in Spanish America where the 
chief resource was time. 

The bluff was seven miles from the town. To the 
north was Pearl Lagoon, where Robert Clarence, chief 
of all the Mosquitos, black and brown, dwelt with his 
retinue of tippling followers. The Bluefields River 
emptied into a bay at the northern edge of the town, a 
typical tropical stream flowing through a trackless for- 
est. Further north was Great River, with its exhausted 
rubber trees and mahogany camps. Higher still were 
gold streams, where a few pioneers in placer mining 
were industriously washing sand in the pan, and in the 
long watches of the tropical night dreaming uneasily of 
a new California. The Mosquito coast is a narrow 
border of coral reef and sand, deeply indented with bays 
where the forest rivers pour into the Caribbean Sea their 
waters, swollen into torrents during the rainy season. 
In huddles of bamboo huts, on the shores of the lagoons, 
are a few thousands of degenerate, Indians. It is a low- 
lying level coast, with a white line of curling surf at its 
base, and a background of wilderness of rich luxuriance 
and unchanging repose. 

The run across the lagoon was made in silence and 
with a dismal feeling of disappointment ; but when the 
town was reached there was a reaction. An American 



344 TROPICAL AMERICA 

landlord provided a palatable dinner, and opened for the 
accommodation of his guests rooms which were clean 
and cool. English and Americans were at hand to pilot 
the visitors in their first stroll through the town. Rough 
and unpretentious as the Mosquito capital was, it had a 
picturesque charm of its own and a setting of tropical 
vegetation of real beauty. A foreign colony of mer- 
chants engaged in the banana, mahogany, and rubber 
trades was revealed in a most hospitable mood. 

The mission bell tolled the hour for evening service, 
for it was Sunday, and a motley congregation of ne- 
groes, of many shades of color, assembled in an unpre- 
tentious church, men and boys sitting on benches to the 
right of the preacher's desk, and women and girls to 
the left. To one who had been tramping for months 
through Latin cathedrals and Spanish churches, and 
witnessing the pomp and glory of religious processions 
and ceremonials, this simple and orderly Protestant ser- 
vice was an almost startling surprise. The preacher 
spoke with a marked German accent, but his sermon 
was homely, plain, and practical. There were grotesque 
glimpses of negro character, but there was more in the 
mission service to command respect than to excite ridi- 
cule. All forms of Sunday amusement are prohibited 
in Bluefields. There is no cockpit ; there are no gam- 
bling houses ; saloons are closed, and virtuous inhabi- 
tants are expected to be in their beds not long after 
curfew. Bluefields under negro rule assumes to be a 
strictly moral town. 

The Moravian missions are the only religious stations 
in a rich tract of territory, 200 by 40 miles in area. Prot- 
estantism is supreme in the Reservation. When a new 
chief is elected there is a service corresponding roughly 



THE MOSQUITO RESERVATION 845 

to a coronation. Robert Clarence, a full-blooded Mos- 
quito Indian, was elevated to the executive office on 
January 29, 1891. The head men of the tribe were 
numbered in the supreme court by vice-President Pat- 
terson, and their ballots were unanimously cast for this 
swarthy young prince of the royal line. A procession 
was formed, and the now chief was conducted in state 
to the Moravian chapel, where the Reverend Brother 
Erdemann read passages from the Old Testament, relat- 
ing to Saul and Solomon, prayed fervently for the lad, 
and preached a long sermon in the Mosquito tongue. 
The oath of office was administered, a watch and chain 
were presented to him by the Nicaraguan commission- 
ers, there was a big feast, and rockets were set off in 
the evening. The next day the chief was bundled off 
to Pearl Lagoon, and J. W. Cuthbert, a full-blooded 
negro, was invested with full political power as Attor- 
ney-General and executive adviser. As the mortality 
among the chiefs is very high, owing either to intemper- 
ance or assassination by poisoning, these elections are 
of frequent occurrence. It is sometimes necessary to 
baptize the chief on election day; but he is invariably a 
member of the Moravian Church, and is installed at the 
mission chapel. 

The sceptre of the Mosquito kings has been captured 
by a Yankee, and smuggled out of Bluefields in a hat- 
box. Mr. Spellman, representing a Boston firm in the 
mahogany trade, invited me to his house, after the Sun- 
day evening service, and displayed the crown. As it 
was midnight, and he was to sail for Boston in the 
morning, I may claim the honor of being the last wit- 
ness of the departing glory of royalty on the Mosquito 
coast. It was a shabby crown of little intrinsic value. 



346 TROPICAL AMERICA 

It was a band of tarnished silver, with a red plush vel- 
vet cap, and a lining of soiled chamois skin. The silver 
was beaten out into twelve conventional oak leaves, 
with a coronet clasp in front. Underneath this line of 
clumsy ornament, which suggested in a vague way that, 
in the early days of Mosquito royalty, British clubs were 
trumps, there were two beaded lines, with spaces in the 
circlet for alternating diamonds and seals of tortoise 
shell. The jewels had been removed, and probably 
pawned, in the vicissitudes of royalty. Each empty 
space represented demijohns of whiskey consumed by 
tippling kings. Despoiled of its jewels, the crown was 
left for safe keeping with a queen mother, and she sold 
it to a trader. When the lumber camps were opened 
in the mahogany district, Mr. Spellman procured it, and 
carried it north, without the knowledge of the Indians. 
The crown was originally bestowed, through British 
intrigue, at Jamaica. The Mosquito coast, while dis- 
covered by Columbus, was not occupied by the Span- 
iards, as there were no indications of gold, and as the 
natives were degraded and impoverished. During the 
seventeenth century buccaneers took advantage of its 
sheltered lagoons. Bluefields received its name, accord- 
ing to local tradition, from Bleevelt, a fine old Dutch 
corsair, whose hiding-place was behind the bluff. The 
Indians, named by the Spaniards, Moscos, came in time 
to be known as Mosquitos. Either from the wreck of a 
slave-ship, or from the escape of runaway negroes from 
Jamaica and the Spanish settlements, a hybrid race of 
Indian-African breed sprang up and took possession 
of the forest coast. British traders induced a party 
of chiefs to go to Jamaica, and apply to the authorities 
there for protection. One of them was made a king, 



THE MOSQUITO EESERVATION 347 

and returned with a crown. The British flag was sub- 
sequently raised on the coast, but the Spanish Govern- 
ment resented the invasion. By treaties, negotiated in 
1783 and 1786, England abandoned all claims to the 
coast, but retained the privilege of cutting logwood in 
Belize. When the Central American States revolted 
against Spain, the British protectorate over the Mos- 
quito coast was revived. The farce of coronation was 
repeated several times at Belize, the sovereigns invari- 
ably vindicating their title to royalty by remaining as 
drunk as princes during their short reigns. After the 
negotiation of the Clayton-Bulwer treaty, and the nom- 
inal abandonment of the British protectorate, the kings 
were known as chiefs, but were generally chosen from 
the royal family. The silver crown ceased to be a 
sceptre of royal prerogative guaranteed by England. 
It was packed away with the old clothes of the royal 
family, and finally pawned, and surrendered to a Yankee 
trader. 

The sceptre has passed away, but political power re- 
mains in the hands of the blacks and the Moravian mis- 
sionaries. There are several thousands of Indians of 
the Rama, Wulva, and Smu tribes clustered in small 
communities on the banks of the rivers and the shores 
of the lagoons. The independence of these tribes was 
guaranteed by a treaty negotiated in 1860 between 
Great Britain and Nicaragua ; but practically home rule 
involves negro domination. There is an Indian chief 
at the head of the territorial government, but all the 
officials and magistrates are blacks. The Reservation 
makes its own laws, collects its own customs revenue, 
and is virtually independent of Nicaragua. There is a 
low tariff, and there is also an export duty on rubber ; 



348 TROPICAL AMERICA 

and while the seaboard is nominally under the dominion 
of the Spanish Republic, it is practically a self-legislat- 
ing, self-governing, and English-speaking community. 
The Clayton-Bulwer treaty, supplemented by the con- 
vention with Nicaragua, has had the singular effect of 
establishing the Moravian missions as a State Church 
and negro rule as the political order. 

Nicaragua covets this territory which is hers only in 
name. The Bluefields River is rapidly becoming the 
centre of a most profitable banana trade, employing 
lines of steamers from New Orleans, Galveston, Savan- 
nah, New York, and Boston. Great River leads into 
one of the finest mahogany belts in Central America. 
About 2,750,000 feet of this lumber were sent to Bos- 
ton in 1890 for the construction of Pullman cars. The 
rubber trees, while injured by rough treatment, are an 
important source of wealth. The streams beyond Great 
River are reputed to have gold in their beds. The 
Mosquito coast is a valuable one, and Nicaragua aspires 
to drive 'out the negroes and to establish her customs 
line from Greytown, which by treaty is now a free port, 
to Cape Gracias. There are signs of an impending con- 
flict for the possession of the Reservation. Recently 
Corn Island has been occupied, and Rama on the Blue- 
fields River converted into a Nicaraguan garrison, al- 
though both are technically within the limits of the 
Reservation. These were overt acts which excited ap- 
prehension among the negroes, and the presence of 
swaggering Nicaraguan officers at Rama has kept Blue- 
fields in a constant state of panic. 

There would be annexation at a moment's notice if 
the Treaty of Managua did not constitute Great Britain 
the guardian of the rights of the Indians and their black 



THE MOSQUITO RESERVATION 349 

masters. It is only fear of complications with England 
that prevents an invasion of the Reservation from Rama. 
So one chief after another is baptized, installed, and 
buried, and the signs of an irrepressible race conflict 
for the control of the Reservation are multiplied. The 
Spanish planters on the river will not be satisfied until 
Bluefields is wrested from the present conditions of 
negro supremacy and Moravian influence. Every black 
in the Reservation when he sees a Nicaraguan colonel 
sauntering along the roadway involuntarily whispers, 
" I am a British subject and claim protection." These 
are not the conditions for which Mr. Clayton bargained 
when he was entrapped into that wretched diplomatic 
travesty, the Canal Convention of 1850. 

The prospect of an enforced delay of fifteen days in 
a town on the edge of the great Central American forest 
was so appalling, that I entered into protracted negotia- 
tions with the negro postmaster for chartering a small 
sail boat with a Carib crew to take me to Greytown. 
Four mornings in succession the postmaster agreed to 
furnish the boat, if the pilot would consent to. make the 
run, and every evening he reported that the sea was 
very rough, and that the Caribs were afraid to venture 
out. Convinced that the Caribs preferred to spend the 
evenings in furtive dalliance with the dusky maids of 
Bluefields, and were exaggerating the perils of the 
treacherous sea that bore their name, I secured from an 
energetic Canadian in the banana trade the promise of 
another boat and crew. The start was to be made 
at five in the morning. At eight the boat was at the 
wharf and duly provisioned and freighted with baggage. 
It proved to be the postmaster's boat after all, the Carib 
pilot having finally consented under stress of competi- 



350 TROPICAL AMERICA 

tion to take a more hopeful view of sea and weather. 
Professor Bailey and I promptly embarked; but the 
skipper and crew disappeared to take leave of their 
swarthy friends, and it was ten o'clock before they 
rejoined the craft. Then there was another detention, 
the postmaster having decided to put us in charge of 
the mail for Grey town. The Health Officer inspected 
the passengers, and the boat was cleared with due 
formalities. The Caribs hoisted the mainsail and let 
loose the jib, and the little craft crawled away from the 
wharf with barely a breath of wind. Even with five 
hours of unnecessary delay at the pier and with the 
certainty of being becalmed in the lagoon for two hours, 
there was an exhilarating sense of triumph in ha\4ng 
overcome, after a laborious struggle, the inertia of 
Nicaraguan existence. 

The breeze freshened as the boat drew near the bluff, 
and the Carib pilot, in order to give his passengers an 
exhibition of his skill as a navigator, raced with a 
schooner heading out to sea. His craft sailed so close 
to the wind that he gained rapidly upon his clumsy 
rival, soon passed her, and left her a mile behind. No 
martinet of the quarter-deck could enforce sterner 
discipline than this good-natured Carib, with weather- 
beaten face, and a mouth like a hole in a blackened 
firepot. His orders were issued with as much precision 
and formality as though he were captain of a European 
liner instead of skipper of a skiff with two hands under 
him. A landing was made at the bluff with caution 
and deliberation, the two lithe sailors being kept well 
in hand and actively employed. Freight for Greytown 
was taken on board, for although the passengers had 
chartered the boat, the Caribs were alive to the chance 



THE MOSQUITO EESBRVATIOK 351 

of earning a few dollars on their own account. This 
involved protracted conferences on shore, but at last 
the little craft headed for the sea. Bluefields passed 
out of sight. The swirl of the breakers was upon us. 
The Caribbean which I had seen only a week before 
dangerously high, when sailing in a disabled and un- 
manageable steamer, was now pulsating with the faintest 
breath of life. The breeze was fresh and strong, the 
canvas was filled, and the boat bowled along right 
merrily. The old pilot whistled softly for continuance 
of the wind, and headed the boat for Monkey Point 
thirty miles away. 

Sweetest of all sounds to him who loves the sea is 
the swirl of the waves under the keel of a sail-boat. 
There is no creaking rumble of machinery, nor the 
ceaseless clank of steering chains, nor the loud splash 
of propeller blades, but only the measured dip and 
rebound of the boat as it leaps from surge to surge. To 
hear the deep undertones of the ocean one must be 
close to the water, and not high above it on a promenade 
deck, where there is a clatter of human voices. The 
long dark swells, crested with steel-gray, have a music of 
their own, but the ear must be near the heaving breast 
of the sea or it will not be heard. Nature's most deli- 
cate effects of light and shade are to be seen in the 
tropical seas, but not from the deck of a puffing cinder- 
mill that clouds the air with oily smoke. Under the 
intense light of the midday sun a changing field of 
azure, green, and purple flashed its latent fires like an 
opal, only to grow pale with the deep-shadowed slopes 
of the breaking swells. It was a lonely corner of the 
sea ; not a single sail was seen in the run to Greytown ; 
but the translucent waters swarmed with countless 



852 TROPICAL AMERICA 

forms of life. Columbus, when he sailed the Caribbean 
Sea, reported that tropical fish rivalled the plumage of 
the forest birds in color. Under the lea of the coral 
islands, where the depths were shallowest, there was a 
carnival of gold lace, silver sheen, and flaming scarlet ; 
and in the broader, unprotected expanse beyond there 
was a flashing pantomime of flying fish. A fleet of 
Portuguese men-of-war, with their tiny sails of red and 
orange, accompanied us down the coast, the more 
venturesome steering close in and fairly striking the 
gunwale of the boat. Swarms of low flying birds were 
in the air, and now and then a white-winged petrel 
stood on the surface of the waves. 

With the wind constantly freshening, and with the 
current sweeping steadily down the coast, the high bluff 
at the entrance to the Bluefields lagoon was veiled by 
wreaths of gray mist. One island after another was 
passed, each a fairy-like glade of verdure, with surf beat- 
ing high upon a white beach, and palms which had been 
bent and twisted by hurricanes, rooted in the coral dust. 
Seen many miles away, as emerald specks against a 
bright horizon, they were approached hour by hour, until 
their loveliness was fully revealed, and then they were 
watched with lingering regret as they dropped out of 
sight in the northern reaches of the sea. In the south. 
Monkey Point had been looming up during the long, 
tranquil afternoon. Our Carib pilot had promised to 
take us, if the wind should hold out, into a snug harbor 
there at nightfall, where we could sleep on the shore in 
a cabin unless we preferred the open boat under the 
starlit sky. Already the dark lines on the face of this 
heavily wooded headland had deepened into ravines ; 
two tiny islands had been detached from its outermost 



THE MOSQUITO EESEEVATION 353 

edge, and the fringe of surf had been rounded out into 
a curving, ragged beach. Another hour passed as our 
boat drew up slowly to the rocky cape, and the loud 
calls of macaws and shrill-voiced parrots, green and 
yellow, were heard among the high palms. Beyond the 
point another headland was descried close at hand with 
two cays anchored off it. Between the capes there was 
a reach of still water. The promised anchorage had 
been reached before the sun was down. A few Carib 
huts were concealed by the thicket on shore — almost 
the only human habitations on the coast between Blue- 
fields and Greytown. 

It was time for a conference with the Carib pilot. 
Choice was to be made between a night's lodging on the 
floor of one of the native huts and the bare hospitality 
of the boat, with a steamer trunk for a mattress and a 
travelling-bag for a pillow. Unaccustomed as these 
children of the forest were to glimpses of Yankees, and 
especially a Western professor in his war paint, they 
might be inclined to wonder how we would taste, 
whether the big man would be tough, or the little man 
tender, if, reverting to the customs of their ancestors of 
the age of Columbus, they were to roast us to a turn 
over a slow fire. It was not well to stimulate aboriginal 
reminiscence. We decided to sleep in the boat, blan- 
keted in our overcoats, and secure against scorpions and 
fleas. But cocoanuts fresh from the trees were indis- 
pensable. Under the fierce sun, ham sandwiches had 
dissolved with fervent heat, the eggs had addled, and 
the beer had lost its sweetness and life. We were 
hungry, and could not face the disintegration of the 
lunch-hamper. Young cocoanuts would keep us alive 
until we reached Greytown. 



354 TROPICAL AMERICA 

The Caribs leave us at anchor and put out for the 
shore in a small boat, while we watch the parrots among 
the tree-tops of Monkey Point. The tropical forest, 
which stretches across Nicaragua to the coffee tract of 
the West Coast, borders upon the sea. The trees are not 
large, for they stand too close together to allow breath- 
ing space for growth, but their tufted tops are luxuri- 
ant in foliage. Underneath is a maze of vine-tracery. 
Every trunk is covered with parasitic growths and 
hidden from view. Orchids are in bloom twenty feet 
in air, and broad-leaved underbrush and tangled vines 
are matted together in an impenetrable jungle. The 
forest may be rich in mahogany, rosewood, rubber, and 
dye-woods ; but its secret recesses are known only to the 
screaming macaws, the chattering monkeys, and the 
stealthy tigers. Feathery palms and heavily buttressed 
trees are on the high crest of the wild woodland of 
Monkey Point, but there is no trail by which they can 
be reached and a view obtained of the sombre reaches of 
the inland forest. The Caribs on the shore never ven- 
ture far into that broad expanse of untrodden woods. 
They find it easier to shake down the cocoanuts from 
the palms lining the shore, and to fish in their canoes, 
than to cut trails with the machete in the forest. One 
of them follows our Caribs as they return to us mth a 
boat-load of cocoanuts, our meat and drink during the 
remainder of the voyage. 

The sun has gone down, and the stars are setting their 
sentinel lines as we raise the anchor and head southward. 
The glory of a tropical sunset is evanescent, like the 
beauty of Southern women. The crimson streamers, 
the orange and lemon bands of color, the purple haze 
and the scarlet fires centring about the vanishing orb, 



THE MOSQUITO EESERVATION 355 

quickly fade into gray, and night rolls down sud- 
denly like a black curtain dropped by a scene-shifter, 
to the signal of a sunset gun. With the sun goes the 
breeze. There is not air enough to fill the sails, which 
are flapping from side to side as the boat lurches in a 
beam sea. As the night deepens, the stars enable us to 
see the forest-clad shores slowly dropping astern. The 
current is bearing us out to sea without a breath of wind. 
What matters it, so long as the stock of young cocoa- 
nuts holds out ? A few strokes of the knife will open 
one, and then there is a bowlful of tipple that satisfies 
both hunger and thirst and steeps one with somnolence. 
The Professor takes the hummock of baggage for his 
bed, while I crawl into the bottom of the lifeboat. 
Around us is the broad expanse of the Caribbean heav- 
ing under the steady glow of the tropical constellations. 
The pilot grasps the tiller firmly as he ostentatiously 
braces himself for an all-night watch. Passengers and 
crew are at liberty to sleep as they may. 

Morning brings with it a faint violet flush that pre- 
cedes the sunrise, — a faint tone that is not light, but 
has the promise of it. The stars are still aglow, and we 
cannot tell in what quarter the sun will rise. There is 
no land in sight. The Carib pilot has been heading by 
guesswork, or more probably he has been dozing the 
greater part of the night and allowing the boat to take 
its own course. The Professor whips out a pocket- 
compass, and discovers that the bow is pointing due 
northeast, or in the direction of Jamaica. The pilot evi- 
dently does not know where he is, but he is too wary a 
veteran to be tricked by a Yankee toy caught on a watch- 
chain. He declines to believe that he is gbing away 
from Greytown instead of approaching it, and is not to 



356 TROPICAL AMERICA 

be convinced until the light is strong enough to enable 
him to catch a distant glimpse of Round Top, the only- 
hill north of the San Juan. When he sees that familiar 
landmark the boat is headed about, and passengers and 
crew unite in a loud call for a breeze. Hour after hour 
passes and the sails are not drawing. The dead calm 
stretches through the forenoon, and the glare of the mid- 
day sun brings with it no change. At least half of the 
cocoanuts have been tapped, and the boat only crawls by 
inches to the haven where dinners are served. This, 
indeed, is Mananaland. Yankee energy may fret and 
fume, but it cannot prevail to drive a boat in the 
Caribbean that is caught in a dead calm. 

At last, soon after noontime, the welcome wind came 
to help out the sluggish current. The cloud-puff of 
smoke in the horizon which had been seen from day- 
break and identified as the foul breath of one of the 
canal dredges, drew nearer and larger hour by hour. 
, The cluster of buildings on the outer beach, used by the 
Canal Company as their headquarters, hospitals, work- 
ing rooms, and chief engineer's residence, was first seen, 
and then further up the harbor Greytown itself. The 
breeze freshened and carried us over the bar to the nar- 
row entrance of the port, where a steam pile-driver and 
a huge dredge were anchored off the unfinished break- 
water. Opposite the dredge were sand heaps midway 
in the channel. A sharp turn brought us to the open- 
ing of the canal, where another dredge was in opera- 
tion. The lagoon beyond the breakwater was broad 
and spacious, and the town lay behind it. The Pro- 
fessor and T were not in a condition of mind or body 
favorable for scientific observation of the canal. We 
had supped, breakfasted, and lunched on cocoanuts. 



THE MOSQUITO RESERVATION 357 

and were in need of a change of regimen. The delay 
caused by the necessity of reporting to the customs 
officials the arrival of the passengers and mails seemed 
intolerable. When permission to land was given, the 
Caribs paddled us up to a little creek and dropped our 
baggage at a worm-eaten wharf. A short walk brought 
us to a shabby plaza, with a Catholic church and a Bap- 
tist chapel, flanked on the opposite side by two hotels. 
A street-car trundling by and a club-house were signs 
of progress. Three crosses a block away, where the 
Crucifixion scene was to be enacted as a Passion Play 
with coarse realism in a few days, were intimations of 
mediaeval mummery and superstition. There would be 
ample leisure for full observation of all these novelties 
and vagaries. Our first quest after our cruise with the 
Caribs was a well-cooked English dinner, and we found 
it, and it was something more than milk in the cocoa- 
nut. 



XVIII 

UP THE SAN JUAN 

CONTRAST BETWEEN PANAMA AND GRETTOWN — THE NICA- 
RAGUA CANAL PASSAGE OF THE COLORADO BAR — THE 

CENTRAL AMERICAN FOREST — THE RIVAL INTEROCEANIC 

WATERWATS LAKE NICARAGUA — WALKEr's EXPLOITS — 

AMERICAN CONTROL OVER AN INTEROCEANIC CANAL 

Greytown has become like Panama the base of 
engineering operations for the construction of an inter- 
oceanic canal, but it has remained a somnolent and 
reputable town. Two years of sluggish work on the 
harbor improvements and the canal have not wrought 
any perceptible change in the morals of the community. 
The times are dull and there is no feverish excitement. 
Tainted adventurers, diamond speculators, gamblers, 
and rakes have not taken possession of the town. At 
Panama there was a mad revel of profligacy. At 
Greytown there is a modest club-house where billiards 
are played and strangers are entertained hospitably ; but 
there are no signs of improvidence, reckless play, and a 
prolonged debauch of speculative excitement. Nothing 
has occurred to vary the monotony of drowsy existence. 
There are no contractors flaunting their jewels and 
bragging of fortunes made in the course of a few 
months or lost at the gaming table in a single night. 
Those employed in the canal work are living quietly, 
spending very little money, and complaining because 
they are not well paid. There is every indication of 
368 



UP THE SAN JUAN 359 

economical and even close management of the finances 
of the construction company. Work has either dragged 
or has been imperfectly and wastefully done from the 
lack of suitable plant, financial resources, and an ade- 
quate force of laborers. The Panama scheme was 
floated on champagne" and cognac. The Nicaragua 
Canal holds water only; but, unfortunately, it is slack 
water at a low level. 

Every facility for examining the work and plant was 
offered to me by Mr. Menocal, the Chief Engineer. I 
saw the dredges in operation at the breakwater and in 
the entrance cut of the canal, visited the pier, wharves, 
machine shops, headquarters, and hospitals and went out 
on the railway ten miles to the advanced camps of the 
construction parties. The force employed in March, 
1891, did not exceed 600 men, large reductions having 
been effected as soon as the expenditures passed the 
limit guaranteed by the company in its contract with 
the Government of Nicaragua. There was an artificial 
attempt to keep up appearances of work at various 
points, but no keen observer could go about the lagoon 
without perceiving that retrenchment was the order of 
the day. As a long period was allowed for the comple- 
tion of the canal by the conditions of the contract there 
was no pressing necessity for haste, and progress would 
inevitably be slow until arrangements were made in 
New York, Washington, or London for securing the 
capital required for successful handling of the plant. 

When work was begun in October, 1889, the harbor 
of Greytown was completely closed by sand dunes 
lying high above water from shore to shore. At New 
Orleans and at Bluefields I had been repeatedly told 
that the harbor was rapidly filling with sand from the 



360 ■ TROPICAL AMERICA 

San Juan River, and that engineering operations would 
ultimately be abandoned because there was not suffi- 
cient force in the current to wash out the entrance and 
to prevent the formation of a new bar. Such criticism 
was declared by Mr. Menocal to be based upon the erro- 
neous assumption that a sluggish river had sealed the 
harbor. The real agent had been the sea waves filled 
with the wash of the Colorado River. These waves 
striking the spit at the eastern side had heaped it 
higher and higher with sand year by year, and built it 
out further and further until the opposite shore was 
reached. In this way what was once a deep harbor 
easily approached from the sea was converted into a 
fresh-water lagoon. The first work was the restoration 
of the harbor by the formation of a new coast line, 
which would shelter the entrance channel from the 
wash of the waves. In fourteen months a breakwater 
was built, and when it was only half finished the harbor 
was opened. 

While the engineers were successful in the first onset 
they had not won their battle. Nature is a stubborn 
antagonist, and has to be conquered foot by foot on her 
own ground. During the early months of 1891 there 
was a succession of fierce northers, and while the stabil- 
ity of the jetty was not impaired there were fresh depos- 
its of sand in the entrance passage. Old forces resumed 
the attack upon the harbor with greatly diminished 
power, but with su.fiicient efficiency to diminish the 
depth of water at least five feet. Experience had 
shown that a short pier would be required, on the oppo- 
site side of the channel from the main breakwater, in 
order to protect the passage from the swirling of the 
sand under unusual conditions of wind and current. 



UP THE SAN JUAN 361 

While the work will be liable to temporary interruption 
from the same causes, which have operated to deposit 
sand shoals across the mouth of the harbor, the engi- 
neers are confident that when the two piers are finished 
the action of the sea waves will be restricted to beach 
building outside the line of the channel. If their 
expectations are fulfilled there will be an admirable 
harbor for shipping entering or leaving the canal. A 
spacious lagoon will be approached by a broad channel 
twenty feet deep at the lowest. 

The canal cut had been opened in March, 1891, for 
a distance of 1200 yards, with excavation to the depth 
of sixteen feet. This was the entrance to the sea-level 
section, which was to be carried from Greytown to the 
first lock in the valley of the Deseado, a small stream 
descending from a high ridge known as the Divide. The 
dredges were cutting sand and doing good work; but 
there would be better progress, the engineers declared, 
when the flat alluvial deposits of loam and clay in that 
section were reached. The width of the cut was 250 
feet ; but it would be broadened about 50 feet before 
the completion of the work. A second pair of dredges 
following the first would increase the depth of the 
channel to 35 feet. The sand was carried over the 
railway which had been constructed for a distance of 
nine miles toward the Divide, and was dumped upon 
the roadbed of a new section which had been graded 
for a distance of another mile. The railway, which has 
been built through Swamps bordering upon the San Juan- 
illo, is to be extended io Ochoa, where the canal will 
open into the San Juan River above a great dam. The 
excavations made for the railway have confirmed the 
results of borings along the line of the canal, and have 



362 TROPICAL AMERICA 

demonstrated the facility with which dredging opera- 
tions can be conducted the greater part of the way. 
For the first 121 miles, a depth of 30 feet can be secured 
with the aid of dredging machinery alone. The rock 
strata are found where stable foundations are required 
for the locks. Between Ochoa and Greytown there 
will be little more than seventeen miles of actual 
excavation, fifteen miles of free navigation being pro- 
vided by natural basins. The locks which will be re- 
quired have already been duplicated in the Lake Superior 
canals, and have been shown to be equal to the require- 
ments of an enormous carrying trade. There will be 
three of these locks in the eastern and as many in the 
western section. 

A large plant was purchased by the company at Colon, 
including seven dredges. The dredges were not adapted 
for operating successfully in rough water at the break- 
water, where accidents were constantly happening owing 
to the deterioration of the plant while it was at the 
Isthmus ; but in the canal cut they were effective. The 
working quarters of the company are between two and 
three miles from Greytown, and are connected with the 
Chief Engineer's residence and the hospitals by a narrow 
gauge railway, and by telephone lines with the cataps 
and other points. The machine-shops are hardly equal 
to the requirements of so great a work, but all the other 
buildings are substantial structures. The company has 
a telegraph service extending to Castillo fifty-one miles 
distant, where connection is made with the government 
wires. An aqueduct was undertaken for supplying the 
town and headquarters with water, but was not com- 
pleted. The staff is strong in the engineering and 
drafting departments. The final survey of the line cost 



UP THE SAN JUAN 363 

1400,000, and occupied a large force for three years. 
The work has been done with thoroughness, as many as 
eighty miles having been surveyed for each one of actual 
canal line. The hospitals, while less pretentious than 
those at Panama, are well planned and equipped for 
service; but there has been so little sickness in the 
working force that the resources of the staff have not 
been fairly tested. If the records of eighteen months 
are to be depended upon, it will be safe to conclude that 
the canal can be constructed without the payment of 
high tribute in mortality. The working force has been 
small in comparison with the army employed on the 
Isthmus ; it has not suffered from malarial fevers or 
any form of pestilence. There were only a dozen 
patients in the wards when I visited them, and the 
majority of these were suffering from accidents. 

The general impression which I carried away from 
Greytown was that the staff had shown itself equal to 
the requirements of planning a great work, but had 
been hampered by lack of money and appliances. The 
dredging in the inner channel had been wastefully con- 
ducted, because the sand was thrown upon the break- 
water where much of it was washed back. The engineers 
took pains to demonstrate that the expense of every kind 
of work so far as they had gone, had been less than the 
estimates. Much of the dredging ought to have been 
cheap as it was only half-done. When the sand is loaded 
into barges and dumped into the sea beyond the outer 
bar there will be a fairer comparison between actual and 
estimated cost. There were several serious grounds for 
criticism in the harbor work, such as the delay in filling 
up sections of the pier with stone. With a larger force 
and a complete plant there would undoubtedly be signs 



364 TKOPICAL AMERICA 

of American thoroughness and precision in the engi- 
neering operations. A thousand feet of breakwater, 
twelve hundred yards of canal excavation, ten miles of 
railway, and a hundred structures of various kinds, the 
clearing of the line of the canal and a completed survey 
represented what had been accomplished during eigh- 
teen months. The enterprise had barely been begun. 
The great rock cut at the Divide had not been ap- 
proached. The Deseado, San Francisco, and Tola basins 
were to be banked and regulated. Not a stone had been 
turned for the big dam at Ochoa. A base of operations 
had been established and much preparatory work had 
been done ; and while the reduction of decimals in esti- 
mates of cost might be a pleasant recreation, the staff 
had really not gone far enough to justify acceptance of 
any figures for the probable expense of the canal. Mr. 
Menocal named $65,000,000 in conversation with me. 
Another expert who had been over every foot of ground 
and examined the estimates in detail, employed the 
figure three as a common multiple for the calculations 
of every section. The staff has hardly won its spurs, 
much less the battle. It has begun the breakwater, the 
canal cut, the construction railway and the aqueduct, 
and has not carried any one of these projects to com- 
pletion. Its capacity for directing the main engineering 
works remains to be demonstrated. 

The San Juan is a noble river, but it ends ignomini- 
ously. Twenty miles from the sea the Colorado taps 
its current and draws off the main volume of its waters. 
What remains oozes into shallow lagoons and is scat- 
tered among shifting sand bars. When the long rainy 
season sets in there is enough water for both rivers. 
For nine months of the year there is unimpeded navi- 



UP THE SAN JUAN 365 

gation from Lake Nicaragua to Greytown; but from 
March, to June, when the water is very low, a series of 
dangerous rapids has to be passed, and the Colorado fol- 
lowed over a line of breakers to the sea. As it was the 
middle of March when I left Greytown, I had a long 
and laborious journey from the Caribbean to the Pacific. 
The first stage of the journey was the outside pas- 
sage from the unfinished breakwater to the Colorado 
bar. It was made in a stanch but leaky galley com- 
manded by an American naval officer. The Petrel was 
passed outside the bar at Greytown, a swaggering little 
warship, with four formidable guns. The first cape 
beyond the breakwater is known as Harbor Head, where 
a passage from the lagoon is gradually silting up with 
sand. Beyond it there is another outlet of the San 
Juan, which is flushed out during the rainy season. 
This opens seaward, and not into the lagoon, which 
receives the diminished waters of the San Juan and 
forms the harbor of Greytown. Colorado bar is in 
Costa Rica. It is a line of reefs, with swirling currents 
and foaming breakers, where steamers of light draught 
are in danger of striking submerged rocks even when 
the sea is smooth. When the water is rough, and a high 
surf is running over the bar, the passage is one to 
induce a feeling of giddiness. The naval officer takes 
charge of the wheel as the breakers are approached, 
and the glow on his face and the sparkle in his eyes 
disclose his sense of excitement. It is for the sake of 
piloting the boat over the bar that he is content with 
his position as commander of a craft little better than 
a tow-boat. For three minutes of each passage he has 
the exhilarating consciousness of being in extreme 
danger, and of having other men's lives dependent 



366 TEOPICAL AMERICA 

upon his self-possession and nerve. The line of treach- 
erous reefs is directly ahead; the boat quivers from 
stem to stern ; a moment more and it is in the breakers 
and has shot through them, its decks showered with 
spray; and the captain leaves the wheel, his interest 
in the voyage at an end. 

A little steamer named the Yrma lay at a wharf near 
the mouth of the Colorado. It had brought down the 
river a number of passengers from Managua and Leon, 
and they had been a week on the way. This did not 
promise well for a quick passage to the Pacific; but 
whoever travels in Central America has ceased to bor- 
row trouble or to take note of time, jogging along as 
rapidly as possible, and counting a little progress each 
day as a great gain. In the course of two hours, which 
I passed very pleasantly in conversation with one of the 
belated passengers, Mr. Hall, formerly United States 
Minister in Central America, freight was exchanged, 
and the two steamers started out together, one for 
Grey town and the other for Machuca Rapids. 

The banks of the Colorado are low and marshy in 
the lower reaches, and the waters swarm with alligators 
of large size. There are numerous islands covered 
with sedgy underbrush and stagnant reaches at every 
turn of the channel. Then opens a dense tract of 
impenetrable wilderness stretching from the coast to 
Lake Nicaragua. The trees are bound together with a 
tangle of parasitic plants and vines. The trunks are 
bare for fifteen or twenty feet, and then the branches 
spread out in all directions, loaded with lichens, mosses, 
and festoons of orchids and creepers. The trees are 
crowded close together, and are straight and slender, 
with foliage high above the gi-ound. From a distance 



UP THE SAN JUAN 367 

the tropical forest looks like the woodlands along the 
banks of a northern river; but when the shore is 
approached tufted tops of palms, and tangled tracery 
of parasitic vines, are unerring indications of the vege- 
tation of the torrid zone. The San Juan is the only- 
highway through a wilderness, where there are no 
roads, no clearings, no grassy levels, and no habitations, 
and where a trail has to be cut with the knife, if mahog- 
any is to be felled or rubber trees are to be milked. 
It is a forest where the most beautiful orchids hang 
from bough to bough, and where parrots, toucans, and 
tanagers are fluttering and screaming in the tree tops. 
As mile after mile is passed, the heavily wooded banks 
close like palisades behind the puffing little steamer, 
and fresh walls of tropical vegetation, ribbed with the 
white trunks of dead trees, open drearily in advance. 

The first night was passed at the junction of the San 
Juan and Colorado rivers. On the second afternoon 
Ochoa was reached, at the entrance to the highlands. 
This is the point where the great dam is projected, so 
as to increase the depth of water in the river, and to 
create a ship channel, which will be navigable at all 
seasons. What can now be seen is a little creek, the 
Machado, on the north bank, with high wooded hills on 
each side of the river. The canal will enter the river 
above the dam, 31-|- miles from Greytown, by way of the 
Deseado and San Francisco basins. The dam is to be 
1250 feet long, with abutments of 650 feet, and is to be 
built of rock filling and earth backing, averaging 61 feet 
in height above the river bottom, 25 feet in thickness at 
the top, and 500 feet at the bottom. The material for 
this dam will be brought by the construction railway, 
from the Divide, where the great cut is to be made. 



368 TBOPICAL AMERICA 

Since dams of larger dimensions than those of Ochoa 
have been built, this engineering work is not to be con- 
demned as impracticable. If the ends are carried well 
into the hills, and the structure heavily weighted with 
rock, and provided with substantial concrete walls, it 
will be strong enough to resist flood pressure during the 
rainy season. The dam will create a slack-water chan- 
nel, 1000 feet wide, with depths ranging from 30 to 130 
feet. Large areas of river-bank and forest will be 
flooded, and the river San Carlos, now an insignificant 
creek, will be enlarged into a spacious lagoon, navigable 
for long distances, into the heart of Costa Rica. 

The channel as it is now, seen at low water, is ob- 
structed by a series of rapids. At Machuca, where a 
little stream flows into the San Juan from the North, 
there are two bends, with an island midway, and two 
lines of rapids, which cannot be passed at high water. 
The Yrmd's freight was transferred to barges, which 
were cautiously poled up the rapids, — an operation 
requiring three hours. The passengers had to choose 
between following their baggage in the barges, and 
walking two miles through the forest, over a rough 
trail. Then, in due course of Nicaraguan time, — the 
slowest reach of the pendulum on the planet, — a little 
steamer, the Adele, came down from Castillo, and res- 
cued the passengers from the ravages of mosquitoes and 
the pangs of hunger. The Bolas rapids were further 
up the river, opposite a high bank, and not a long way 
off were the Mica rapids, where a line of rocks stretched 
across the river. The Adele hung off the rocks at least 
five minutes, unable to make headway against the cur- 
rent, although the furnaces had been raked down, and 
the steam pressure was beyond the safety mark. The 



UP THE SAN JUAN 369 

Castillo rapids were avoided by a short tram route. 
Another little steamer started under the shadow of a 
crumbling old fortress, and before breasting the Toro 
rapids was tied up along shore, where the firemen could 
clear the furnaces of ashes and pile on the wood, so as 
to make a roaring blaze. When the steam was at a 
dangerously high point the boat shot out into the stream, 
to struggle laboriously against the current, and to gain 
upon it by inches. With a hundred passengers huddled 
around a boiler, which ought to have been condemned 
years before along with the craft, there was ample leis- 
ure for conjecturing the consequences of an explosion. 

All these rapids, except the Toro, will be covered 
with 23 feet of water in the dry season by the construc- 
tion of the Ochoa dam. At Machuca and Castillo some 
blasting will be done, but at Toro dredging will be re- 
quired. Apart from the dam at Ochoa, a ship-channel 
of great breadth and adequate depth will be obtained, 
with very little effort and expense. The engineers have 
estimated that not more than 21 embankments will 
have to be constructed for the control of the increased 
volume of water. Nature has done a large part of the 
work of connecting the two oceans, and has greatly 
facilitated the completion of the waterway by man. 

The total length of the proposed canal is 169| miles. 
Of this only 28.89 miles represent canal in excavation. 
There will be free navigation for 150.78 miles, 120|- 
miles in the river and lake and the remainder in arti- 
ficial basins, which will be regulated by embankments. 
The geological conditions are most favorable, except at 
the Divide where there is a rock cut of three miles from 
the Deseado to the San Francisco basin. The great reser- 
voirs of Lake Nicaragua and Lake Managua will furnish 



370 TROPICAL AMERICA 

a high-level water supply adequate for meeting all the 
requirements of canal lockage and protection of the 
waterway in the rainy season. At the Isthmus there 
were mountains to be pierced and brought down to the 
sea-level; there were floods to be regulated without 
sufficient area for reservoirs ; there was a deadly cli- 
mate ; and there were no winds in the Bay of Panama 
to carry sailing vessels out into the Pacific from the 
canal. The engineers there seemed to be working against 
nature. In Nicaragua nature has nearly worked out 
the problem of interoceanic transit without assistance 
from man. The lake is within seventeen miles of the 
Pacific, and the river is a ship channel for 64 miles, or 
within 311 miles of the Caribbean. There are three 
natural basins of large area which can be flooded during 
the rainy season without injury to the canal. There is 
a climate favorable for the construction of a work of 
the first magnitude. There are prevailing winds which 
will carry sailing vessels into the canal on either side, 
without risk of their being becalmed for weeks at the 
other end. Nature is not antagonized but is the con- 
stant ally of the Nicaragua project. 

With the passage of the Toro rapids ended the ^dcis' 
situdes and makeshifts of the journey. The Managua^ 
the best steamer of the line, made a quick and delight- 
ful passage to San Carlos, and transferred a large com- 
pany of travellers to the Victoria., which crossed the 
lake in twenty-four hours, calling at various stations. 
The passage across Lake Nicaragua offers many scenic 
attractions. From San Ubaldo, the course lies directly 
across the lake to San Jorge on the western shore. 
The most impressive mountain of this inland sea is 
Ometepe, a volcanic peak a little over 5000 feet in 



UP THE SAN JUAN 371 

height. It stands on a large island in the lake and 
like Madera, a companion peak, seems to rise out of the 
water until its cone cleaves the sky. From San Carlos 
its shapely outline is clearly seen, but the noble propor- 
tions of the volcano are not revealed until the lake is 
crossed from San Ubaldo. Hour by hour it is approached 
until the steamer skirts the edge of the island and runs 
into San Jorge. Further north towards Granada there 
is another massive volcano, Mombacho, towering to a 
height of 4700 feet. These mountains being seen 
from the level of the lake have the effect of being twice 
as high as they are. Their flanks are covered with 
dense forest and their summits are streaked with lava 
streams, unerring signs of old-time energy and destruc- 
tive force. If the Nicaragua Canal be completed trav- 
ellers will have magnificent mountain prospects in 
passing from ocean to ocean. While the San Juan will 
offer entrancing glimpses of primeval tropical forest, 
Lake Nicaragua will bring them under the shadow of at 
least one volcano, which is almost pulsating with life, 
and is sometimes crowned with a yellow halo of smoke. 
The western shore of Lake Nicaragua was the scene 
of Walker's military operations. Rivas and San Jorge 
under the shadow of Ometepe and Madera witnessed 
his earliest successes, and his surrender to a guard from 
a United States man-of-war. The short road from the 
lake to the Pacific, which will be followed in the main 
by the ship canal, was his line of supplies since his 
reinforcements were drawn from the steamers touch- 
ing at San Juan del Sur. The withdrawal of these 
steamers in connection with Marcy's diplomacy involved 
his ruin, since adventurers could no longer flock to 
his standard from California and the Southern States. 



372 TROPICAL AIMERICA 

Masaya was the scene of one of his most brilliant sorties, 
and Granada was captured by a master stroke of au- 
dacity, only to be abandoned and burned when it became 
necessary for him to concentrate his forces at Rivas as 
a last line of defence. Houses occupied by him at 
Greytown, and the camping-grounds of his second army 
of filibusters on the Colorado, are still pointed out to 
the traveller who crosses Nicaragua, and his name is 
indissolubly associated with the barren plazas and bat- 
tered churches of Granada. The memory of this famous 
leader of a lost cause has suffered equally from the un- 
discrimihating denunciations of abolitionist foes and 
the panegyrics of partisans. If his character has been 
unjustly despoiled of all soldierly qualities and redeem- 
ing traits, it has also been idealized by poetic license 
until the surviving veterans of his picturesque band of 
filibusters have been unable to recognize the caricature. 
Walker's chief blunder was his failure to recognize the 
law of historical environment. A belated Cortes, in the 
heart of Central America in 1856, was as misplaced and 
fantastic a figure as a pious, bloodthirsty, and Spaniard- 
hating buccaneer would have been on the Caribbean. 

The intervention of Walker in Nicaraguan affairs was 
caused by the rivalries between two cities, Granada 
and Leon, each of which was bent upon ruling the 
country. The same faction feud has continued to this 
day. So strong was the feeling of jealousy, that it was 
necessary to convert a third and more obscure town, 
Managua, into the capital. One governing cabal is con- 
stantly opposed by another, and revolutionary outbreaks 
and temporary dictatorships follow in natural course. 
Central American politics involve plot and counterplot, 
one faction intriguing against another and being merci- 
lessly dealt with in defeat. 



UP THE SAN JUAN 373 

Not only is each of the five Republics between Mexico 
and the Isthmus constantly exposed to political disturb- 
ance, but they are intensely jealous of one another. 
Guatemala and Salvador are constantly menacing each 
other with attack in the north, and for generations 
Costa Rica and Nicaragua in the south have been quar- 
relling over boundaries and cherishing resentments with 
passionate intensity of feeling. These facts have an 
important bearing upon the proposed interoceanic water- 
way. Not only will it pass through a State in which 
the political conditions are most unstable, but the San 
Juan River will also be the disputed boundary between 
two jealous nations. Strong as is the desire of Nica- 
ragua for the successful construction of the canal, it is 
apparently unable to reconcile itself to the idea of shar- 
ing with Costa Rica the honor and advantages of the 
work. National resentments have been revealed at 
every stage of the negotiations conducted by Mr. 
Menocal and Mr. Hall for obtaining the canal conces- 
sions. Contracts were made with both governments, 
for the payment of compensating damages, and for the 
issue of blocks of stock, in return for the concessions ; 
but while each was satisfied with its own terms, neither 
was willing to ratify its engagements with the other. 
Although the frontier dispute was nominally settled by 
the decision of President Cleveland, Nicaragua has not 
accepted the results of arbitration, nor united with Costa 
Rica in the boundary survey. Much diplomatic pres- 
sure will be needed from Washington, before these two 
jealous States can be induced to come to terms, and to 
live peaceably with each other. 

If the canal be completed and opened, it will be neces- 
sary to arm some foreign power with the same right 
of protection w^hich the United States Government has 



374 TROPICAL AMERICA 

exercised over the property of the Panama Railway. 
Under the Monroe Doctrine that power must be the 
United States. The circuit of canal diplomacy will 
never be complete until the Clayton-Bulwer treaty is 
abrogated. So long as that convention, which has 
never served any useful purpose, retains a semblance 
of authority as treaty law, it will be a source of inter- 
national complications. The present guardianship of 
the Mosquito Reservation by England, under a decision 
made by the Emperor of Austria, is an adequate war- 
rant for the withdrawal of the United States from that 
unfortunate compact. The conversion of the lumber 
settlements at Belize into a Crown Colony has implied 
as clear a repudiation of the covenant upon which the 
joint protectorate was based. Before the canal is fin- 
ished, e-wery prohibition of the right of the United 
States to hold political control over it in conjunction 
with the two quarrelsome States through which it 
passes, and also to fortify and to garrison islands in the 
lake near San Carlos, ought to be removed by the 
cancellation or revision of that treaty. 

The Nicaraguan Government, as I learned from vari- 
ous trustworthy sources at Managua, was disappointed 
because the work on the canal was not advancing 
more rapidly, and was listening credulously to criticism 
offered by English and German residents, who were 
doing everything in their power to discredit the enter- 
prise. These opponents of the canal asserted that 
Americans had been talking for forty years about con- 
structing a waterway, and had accomplished little be- 
yond surface surveys and a half-finished breakwater. 
They magnified the engineering difiiculties of the 
work, and assumed that the capital never could be 
raised without a government guaranty, and that the 



UP THE SAN JUAN 375 

United States Congress had practically vetoed the pro- 
posal precisely as it had rejected the canal treaty 
negotiated under the Arthur administration. Having 
demonstrated to their own satisfaction the impractica- 
bility of the project, they referred confidently to the 
railway scheme for connecting the two coasts. An 
English syndicate has already been formed for con- 
structing a railway from San Ubaldo, on the eastern 
shore of Lake Nicaragua, to Rama, on the edge of the 
Mosquito Reservation. This railway of 102 miles will 
be built through the forest, so as to connect the Carib- 
bean with the lake system. An extension of this line 
around Lake Nicaragua to Granada is also projected, 
and this with a loop around Lake Managua will connect 
the oceans by an all-rail route. Some enthusiasts at 
Managua have gone so far as to predict that if the 
Nicaraguan Government can make an amicable arrange- 
ment with the population of the Reservation, England 
will consent to the annexation of the district. The 
bait is thrown out that when the railway is completed 
to Rama, the whole coast from Greytown to Cape Gracias 
will be brought under the control of Nicaragua. How 
this result is to be accomplished, when the Reservation 
is violently opposed to annexation, and when its rights 
are guaranteed by the English treaty and the decision 
of the Emperor of Austria, these speculative diploma- 
tists do not explain. The fact remains that the syndicate 
is providing Nicaragua with a new transit route, while 
an American corporation is conducting with a discour- 
aging degree of deliberation work on the interoceanic 
canal. There is a sharp contrast here between English 
performance and American procrastination and inaction. 



XIX 

GLIMPSES OF CENTRAL AMERICA 

CITIES AND SCENERY OF THE WESTERN PLATEAU PAS- 
SION-PLAYS AND RELIGIOUS PROCESSIONS PROGRESS OF 

COSTA RICA PACTION FEUDS AND STANDING ARMIES 

THE BARRUNDIA AFFAIR FEDERATION AND RAILWAY 

CONSTRUCTION 

Nicaragua, while the largest of the Central American 
States in territorial extent, is, with the exception of 
Costa Rica, the least populous. It has no foreign debt, 
and while its resources are undeveloped, it is in ex- 
cellent financial condition. Its chief exports are coffee, 
rubber, indigo, dyewoods, mahogany, and bananas. 
East of the lakes there is a fine grazing country, sup- 
porting large droves of cattle. Cacao is successfully 
cultivated on the western plateau, and sugar can be 
produced on a large scale, when adequate facilities for 
grinding and boiling the cane are provided. The forests 
are rich in mahogany, cedar, rosewood, ebony, and 
rubber. The east coast is admirably adapted for the 
cultivation of bananas. There are also signs of mineral 
wealth in the interior. The foreign trade of Nicaragua 
is chiefly with Great Britain, Germany, and the United 
States. Germany has the largest share of the imports; 
but the recent development of the banana trade is 
bringing the United States into the first place as a 
market for the exports. 
376 



GLIMPSES OF CENTRAL AMERICA 377 

The principal towns of Nicaragua lie on the western 
plateau that slopes gently toward the Pacific. The 
largest is Leon with a population of 25,000. The second 
in importance is Managua, on the southern shore of 
Lake Managua. It is the capital and is rapidly becom- 
ing the business centre of the country. It has a 
population of 18,000 and has something resembling 
commercial enterprise. Granada, on the western shore 
of Lake Nicaragua, was founded as early as 1522, and 
when burned by Walker was rebuilt without being ma- 
terially improved. In 1890 it suffered from a series of 
severe earthquake shocks, and the population, alarmed 
by the experience, is now declining, not exceeding 
15,000. Ten miles from Granada is the Indian town of 
Masaya, and not far from Corinto, on the coast there is 
a similar town, Chinandega. Rivas lies to the south 
of Granada and has a population of 8000. These six 
cities comprise about one-quarter of the aggregate popu- 
lation of Nicaragua, which in round numbers is 350,000. 
They are all dreary and unattractive. Masaya, owing 
to its Indian characteristics, is the most interesting; 
Leon is the most religious, Managua the most ambitious, 
and Granada the most dilapidated and the shabbiest. 

A description of one town will answer for all. The 
streets are unpaved and grass-grown, and in the rainy 
season are sloughs of slimy mud. The sidewalks are 
raised one or two feet above the street level so as to 
secure houses and shops against floods. The buildings 
are low adobe structures, whitewashed at the sides and 
front, and roofed with red tiles. The walls are very 
thick, so as to secure stability when there are earth- 
quake shocks, and the floors are paved with brick. In 
Managua there are government buildings and a minia- 



378 TROPICAL AMERICA 

ture school of arts with two stories, and the chief hotels 
also have an upper floor ; and on one side of the plaza 
in Leon there is a municipal palace, with a second tier 
of windows ; but these are almost the only exceptions 
to the limitations of ground-floor architecture. The 
shops are mean and shabby ; the houses are forlorn and 
comfortless; and the churches are tawdry within and 
ugly without. The largest church in Nicaragua is the 
cathedral at Leon, fronting upon the plaza; but it is of 
a debased type of architecture, and has a cold and bare 
interior. The plaza church in Managua has a fa9ade 
such as a child could make with building blocks, putting 
a long one at the base, two shorter pieces above it, with 
squares at the ends cut out, and a fourth one in the 
middle above the second layer. A hole is left in the 
centre for a bell, and two low doorways are cut through 
at the base. La Merced Church in Granada is some- 
what better, but shabby withal. The town also has a 
university built in a quadrangle, with a superannuated 
aspect. The most modern structure in urban Nicaragua 
is the railway depot at Granada. 

There is, however, exceedingly varied scenery on the 
Western plateau. Besides Ometepe and Mombacho, the 
majestic mountain landmarks of Lake Nicaragua, there 
is another series of volcanoes known as the Marabios, 
and seen to great advantage from the steamer in the 
passage across Lake Managua. These lava-streaked 
mountains vary in height from 2000 to 7000 feet, and 
there are fourteen of them clustered between the Lake 
and the Gulf of Fouseca. Momotombito, an island hum- 
mock in the Lake at the base of giant Momotombo, is 
the southernmost of the series. Viejo, back of Corinto, 
lies at the northern bound of this old-time centre of vol- 



GLIMPSES OF CENTKAL AMERICA 379 

canic energy. Momotombo ordinarily has a curling 
•wreath of smoke ascending from its crater, but it was 
not on exhibition as an active volcano when I passed it. 
As a mountain of magnificent proportions, symmetry of 
form, and boldness of outline, it is unrivalled in Central 
America. The forests extend from the shore of the 
lake to the edge of the crater, where there is rank grass 
among the ash-heaps and lava beds. The little volcano 
in front of it is a foil for its impressive majesty, and the 
two mountains once seen across the green level of Lake 
Managua will linger in the memory as a silhouette of 
singular beauty. 

From this line of volcanoes to the coast there are 
broad levels, admirably adapted for the cultivation of 
coffee and cacao. At the base of Momotombo there is a 
picturesque Indian hamlet where the railway train is 
taken for Leon and Corinto. The first stage of the jour- 
ney is made through a forest tract, where there are occa- 
sional clearings, and glimpses of the volcanoes. As Leon 
is approached, wild pineapple fences are seen, with herds 
of cattle in green pastures. There are cacao and coffee 
plantations, the shrubs growing in the dense shade of 
banana and coral trees. Palms become more conspic- 
uous as the coast is approached. The plain of Leon, 
bounded by the volcanoes and the sea, has great natural 
beauty. If it were in a high state of cultivation, and the 
scrub forest were cleared away, it would be the loveliest 
garden in Central America. Corinto is the chief port of 
Nicaragua, and the western terminus of the railway and 
inland water system of transportation. It is an insig- 
nificant town, on a low, marshy island. 

While Nicaraguan men are short in stature, sharp and 
irregular in feature, and lean and ill-built in figure, the 



380 TROPICAL AMERICA 

women are shapely, with swarthy faces, black hair 
braided and tightly coiled, and eyes soft and lustrous. 
Custom allows them to wear low-cut, embroidered che- 
mises and cheap gowns, with their arms, neck, and shoul- 
ders bare. Women of the lower class, with their 
copper-colored complexions, resemble the Mexican half- 
breeds. They are not as immodest as their style of dress 
and volatile temperament seem to indicate. There are 
few countries in Spanish America where the women 
have so many homely virtues, or where the men are so 
honest, as in Nicaragua. Although the doors of sleeping- 
rooms in the hotels are neither bolted nor locked, and 
guests herd together in public rooms, under conditions 
favorable for robbery, thieves are unknown. I have 
never travelled in a foreign country where I had the 
same sense of security against dishonesty. Even the 
hackmen in the towns have consciences, and do not 
seek to over-charge strangers. 

Nicaragua is an intensely religious country. I passed 
from ocean to ocean during Holy Week, and witnessed 
the image-bearing processions from town to town. At 
Greytown I missed the closing scenes of the Passion 
Play, enacted in the bare plaza and the sacred precincts 
of "Jerusalem." The triumphal entry under palm 
branches, the Last Supper, the trial before Pilate, the 
mocking, scourging, and Crucifixion between thieves, 
and the Resurrection meeting with the holy women, are 
reproduced there with startling realism. The part of 
Saviour is taken by a man, and enacted with religious 
feeling bordering upon fanaticism. The Last Supper is 
eaten with the twelve on a raised platform. The crowd 
join in the fierce acclaim, " Crucify him ; " and three men 
hang upon as many crosses in the sight of the town, the 



GLIMPSES OF CENTKAL AMERICA 381 

nails only being dispensed with. After the Crucifixion 
there is a funeral pageant, and a large image of the 
Saviour is taken in a glass coffin to the church, with 
the chief men of the town as pall-bearers and honorary, 
guards. Such was the account of the proceedings given 
to me by residents. 

In the western towns religious processions take the 
place of this crude Passion Play. At Granada, Mana- 
gua, and especially at Leon, there is a parade every 
night during Holy Week. A large image is strapped 
upon a mule on Palm Sunday, and escorted by priests, 
soldiers, and bands of music through the streets. On 
Thursday and Friday there are processions, with as 
many as twenty or thirty images dressed in purple and 
black. Hundreds of men and women join in the parade 
behind the hearse, and carry lighted candles, which have 
been blessed for the occasion and are supposed to possess 
peculiar sanctity. The bands play dirges, the garrison 
marches to drum-beat, and the torch-bearers enter the 
churches, and prostrate themselves before the altar. 
Business is suspended during these solemn days, and 
the running of railway trains is prohibited by the Gov- 
ernment. Easter finds the churches filled with the 
images of the Virgin in full mourning, and of the Cru- 
cified with riven side and pierced hands and feet. In- 
congruous as the effects of costume and drapery often 
are, and coarse, and even vulgar, as are the images, there 
is no lack of reverence on the part of the people. 

From Corinto, after halting in the towns of the west- 
ern plateau, I sailed for Costa Rica, passing Brito, the 
canal port, and running into San Juan del Sur for a 
few hours, on the way south. These towns, which were 
prosperous forty years ago, during the era of the Van- 



382 TROPICAL AMERICA 

derbilt transit trade between California and New York, 
are now desolate places. Punta Arenas is the cleanest 
and prettiest port to be found in Central America. It 
stands upon a narrow reach of sandy beach, with a back- 
ground of forest-clad hills. The Gulf of Nicoya, a 
spacious arm of the sea, lies in front of the town, its 
tranquil surface dotted with islands of enchanting love- 
liness. A broad river empties into the Gulf, and forms 
a safe harbor of moderate depth. The town is embow- 
ered in cocoanut clumps, banana tangles, and tropical 
gardens. A stroll along the beach, and across the outer 
rim of grass-grown lanes and commons, reveals nearly 
all the characteristic trees of the tropics, — magnolias 
shading the sidewalks, mangoes and palms standing in 
the fields, and tamarinds, bananas, oranges, and almonds 
ornamenting the gardens. The luxuriant verdure re- 
lieves eyes that are strained by the vivid light reflected 
from the white sand. The town is unpretentious, with 
clusters of small shops and caf^s, an unfinished church, 
and rows of bamboo huts with thatched roofs ; but it is 
homelike, cheerful, and bright. The iron wharf on the 
water front may be out of keeping with the rustic sur- 
roundings ; but this is quickly forgotten when glimpses 
of the cactus hedges and fruit gardens are caught, and 
the simple, unaffected courtesy of the people is revealed. 
Costa Rica has a population several degrees lighter in 
complexion than that of Nicaragua, and markedly supe- 
rior to it in education and refinement. Land is subdi- 
vided until nearly every family owns at least a house 
and garden, and extreme poverty is rare. The people 
are contented, prosperous, and light-hearted. If the 
country is not a Rich Coast, as its name implies, it is 
because it is thinly populated, and its industrial wealth 



GLIMPSES OF CENTRAL AMERICA 38B 

undeveloped. In the interior there is an elevated pla- 
teau, between Alajuela and Cartago, where seven-eighths 
of the total population of 214,000 are centred in a terri- 
tory of 100 square miles. San Jos^, the capital, lies in 
the heart of this fertile tableland, and is encompassed 
with extinct volcanoes, ranging between 7000 and 
12,500 feet above the sea. It is a handsome and pro- 
gressive city, with comfortable hotels, and a refined 
society, noted for hospitality to foreigners. Cartago, 
the second city, lies close at hand, and Alajuela and 
Heredia are connected with the capital by the railway 
system, which extends nearly across the country, from 
Punta Arenas to Port Limon. There is only one short 
break in the line, and that is on the Pacific side, from 
Esparta to Alajuela. As the coffee tract has direct 
railway connection with Port Limon, the chief staple of 
the country is now shipped mainly from the Caribbean 
side. Punta Arenas seems destined to decrease as Port 
Limon increases. The completion of the railway may 
repair its shattered fortunes ; but with the rival port's 
superior advantages as a centre of the banana trade, it 
cannot hope to regain its commercial supremacy. The 
Caribbean coast, however, is markedly inferior to the 
Pacific side, being a marshy tract covered with scrub- 
forest, and it is without a safe anchorage for vessels. 
The northern and southern sections of Costa Rica are 
unexplored wilderness, similar to the trackless forests 
of the San Juan. 

Costa Rica, while the least populous, is the most 
advanced of the Central American Republics. Its capital 
is lighted by electricity and it has cheap telegraphs. It 
has good educational and postal systems, and is display- 
ing great enterprise in the completion of public works 



384 TROPICAL AMERICA 

and in the development of its resources. It has 161|- 
miles of railway in operation, and will be the first State 
to connect the oceans. A railway from the Jimenez to 
the Frio on the border of Nicaragua has been contracted 
for, and this will be brought into connection with the 
main lateral line. The completion of the Nicaragua 
Canal will open a large section of the northern belt 
by rendering the San Carlos navigable through the 
slack-water of Ochoa Dam. There is a foreign debt 
amounting to $11,000,000. Railway projects have been 
dragging from lack of labor, and the expansion of un- 
rivalled resources as a coffee-growing State is retarded 
from the same cause. It has, however, an industrious 
and orderly population, is improving its position year 
by year, and is to be considered the most promising 
community in that quarter of Spanish America. 

In Costa Rica, as in Nicaragua, the military garrisons 
head the religious processions, and are mustered in full 
force during Holy Week. I witnessed the dress parades 
of these ill-disciplined and tattered battalions, and was 
not seriously impressed with the horrors of war in 
Central America. The garrison ordinarily consists of 
a few files of boys in shirt sleeves and bare-feet, lolling 
upon benches outside the barracks, whistling snatches 
from French operas, and toying with their sword bayo- 
nets. Every morning an officer, in a faded blue uniform, 
seeks to impart the rudiments of discipline by drilling 
them with a swaggering air. As I watched these dis- 
orderly evolutions, I found myself wondering what 
would happen, if a squad of New York police were 
to file suddenly into the street and charge upon the 
battalions. Wearing ragged and patched uniforms 
startling in their range and variety, mounting guard 



GLIMPSES OF CENTRAL AMERICA 385 

bare-foot and carelessly flinging their rifles across their 
shoulders at every angle when they march, they are 
fantastic and comical soldiers. The standing armies of 
the four republics, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, 
and Salvador, when massed together, would not exceed 
four thousand men. Guatemala has nominally a larger 
force under arms, but, only about two thousand men are 
ordinarily on duty. One only needs to look at these 
warriors in order to understand why the mortality is 
very low in the battles of the civil wars. Most of the 
shooting is done by boys and is in the air. 

It is not improbable that the political condition of 
these States would be greatly improved, if the armies 
were recruited and rendered more efficient. When the 
military force is weak, it does not serve the useful 
purpose of maintaining public order and preventing the 
outbreak of civil war. It is swayed by every breath of 
intrigue, and is ordinarily reorganized before a general 
election, when its services are required for controlling 
the choice of a President. Every one of the five 
countries is constantly menaced with political disturb- 
ance and open revolt. When 700 raw soldiers form 
the standing army of a State like Costa Rica, cabals 
are inevitably organized and revolutions frequently 
occur, since it is practicable for intriguers with com- 
paratively small financial outlay to muster a force 
equally strong. A good deal of what is known as 
treason in Central America would be more properly 
classed as political campaigning. An ambitious Cabinet 
Ministd^ is anxious to become President, and is baffled 
by Executive disfavor. In order to keep himself before 
the public, and to demonstrate his growing importance, 
he heads a revolt against the government. A little 



386 TKOPICAL AMERICA 

powder is burned and considerable excitement is caused. 
It is a political campaign that is opened. While the 
chances of revolutionary intrigue are multiplied under 
feeble and inefficient military organization, the horrors 
of war are materially diminished. A revolt in Costa 
Rica implies an attempt on the part of scheming politi- 
cians to overthrow the President by arming 200 or 400 
men and taking a standing army of 700 men by surprise. 
These revolutions are not attended with much bloodshed, 
and are not to be regarded as very serious affairs. If 
the standing armies were larger and under better dis- 
cipline, there would be fewer political manoeuvres of 
this sort. 

General Barrundia was a revolutionist of this type. 
He had been Secretary of War, and aspired to be 
President of Guatemala ; but those in power had plans 
of their own, and drove him into exile. Then he had 
recourse to tactics which are constantly employed in 
Central America. He sought to advance his political 
prospects by organizing a revolutionary movement. 
Taking advantage of the state of war between Salva- 
dor and Guatemala, he headed an unsuccessful invasion 
from Mexican territory. His subsequent tragical end 
on the steamer Acapulco in Guatemalan waters was 
caused by the connivance and cooperation of the Ameri- 
can Minister in an attempt to hand him over to the 
mercies of his political enemies. While I was on the 
West Coast the report of the Guatemalan Minister of 
Foreign Affairs on the Barrundia affair was received. 
He took pains to disavow having threatened to attack 
and sink the Acapulco, if the surrender of the passenger 
were refused, and demonstrated that it would have 
been impossible for the authorities to injure the vessel 



GLIMPSES OF CENTRAL AMERICA 387 

even if they had meditated an attack, since there was 
not at the port of San Jose a single piece of artillery 
of any description, with the exception of a little toy 
cannon, which for many years had done service in the 
jvay of firing salutes. This official confession of the 
weakness of the coast defences served to corroborate a 
statement made to me in all seriousness by an American 
resident prominently connected with the life-insurance 
interests of New York. He declared that the captain 
of the Acapulco could have successfully defended his 
ship against any assault from shore by calling his chief 
cook to his aid. With a few pans of boiling water 
from the galley the Guatemalan officers could have 
been beaten back to their boats, if they had attempted 
to board the vessel without the consent of the com- 
mander. The assumption that naval assistance from 
the Hanger and her consort was required for the de- 
fence of the merchant steamer, is as grotesque as the 
idea that the artillery in the toy forts on the Central 
American coast is available for offensive operations. It 
is hardly practicable for a traveller with any sense of 
humor to take a serious view either of military or diplo- 
matic matters in that portion of the world. 

The progress of Mexico during the last decade is 
largely to be attributed to the strong military force, 
which has been kept in reserve and rendered available 
by the new railway and telegraph systems for rapid 
operations in any part of the country. Revolution and 
brigandage have been brought to an end, and industrial 
progress has been promoted by strong military govern- 
ment, with railways in operation for the transportation 
of troops. In the same way the construction of a trunk 
railway system from the Mexican border to Punta Are- 



388 TEOPICAL AMERICA 

nas and Cartago would be of inestimable benefit to the 
cause of civilization in Central America. With facili- 
ties for the rapid movement of troops, the five govern- 
ments would not be constantly in dread of revolutionary- 
outbreaks, and by strengthening their armies they would 
secure what is more urgently needed there than any- 
thing else — stability of political institutions. Such a 
trunk line would tend to bring five jealous States, first 
into intimate commercial relations, and subsequently 
into political union under a confederation such as was 
prematurely planned in 1890. The tentative constitu- 
tion adopted by the five governrnents, with a system of 
alternating national capitals, by which the President of 
each Republic would have become in turn the Execu- 
tive of the confederation, was the work of the politicians 
then in power. President Menendez of Salvador was 
the most influential leader of the movement, and was 
supported by a majority of the legislators of his State. 
Political rivals opposed the scheme, succeeded in assassi- 
nating him, and obtained control of the Government. 
Their supremacy with the subsequent hostilities be- 
tween Guatemala and Salvador proved an insuperable 
obstacle to the federation plan. This was a great mis- 
fortune, since the substitution of one powerful nation 
for five feeble and quarrelsome States would have been 
a great gain for civilization in Spanish America. The 
revival of the federation project can hardly be expected 
until the coffee republics are brought into intimate com- 
mercial relations by the construction of a trunk railway 
from the Mexican border to the heart of Costa Rica. 

The foreign trade of the five Republics, with a popu- 
lation of nearly 3,000,000, and an area equal to that of 
New England, the Middle States, and Maryland, now 



GLIMPSES OF CENTRAL AMERICA 389 

amounts to 131,000,000 annually, and is steadily increas- 
ing. Coffee is the most important product, and it is 
exported on a large scale from all the States except 
Honduras. The commercial development of Central 
America has been to a large extent the result of steam- 
ship service on the Pacific coast. Coffee has been car- 
ried either to San Francisco or Panama, and from the 
Isthmus it has been trans-shipped mainly to Europe 
during recent years. The import trade has been 
controlled by English and German merchants. The 
completion of three lateral lines of railway in Costa 
Rica, Nicaragua, and Guatemala will ultimately transfer 
the base of commercial operations from the Pacific to 
the Caribbean ports. As these ports are already centres 
of the banana trade, and are in constant steam communi- 
cation with the Gulf and Atlantic seaboards, there will 
be cheap freights for coffee, hides, and dye-woods in that 
direction. American trade with Central America will 
be directly promoted by the construction of these lateral 
railways, even if the trunk line on the West Coast be 
deferred for another generation, and the interoceanic 
canal be abandoned. The reciprocity conventions made 
with Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Salvador at the close 
of 1891, and with Honduras and Nicaragua in 1892, 
will bring the United States into closer commercial 
union with the coffee republics, and facilitate an ex- 
change of products of essentially different zone^. The 
completion of the Nicaragua Canal will inevitably tend 
to increase trade with these countries ; but the interests 
of peace and stable government are mainly dependent 
upon railway progress and ultimate federation. 



XX 

OUR CONTINENT 

EUROPEAN COMMERCIAL DEPENDENCIES — THE MONROE DOC- 
TRINE UNINTELLIGIBLE TO SOUTHERN RACES THE PAN- 
AMERICAN CONGRESS THE RECIPROCITY POLICY THE 

THREE AMERICAS' RAILWAY INTEROCEANIC CANALS 

AMERICAN TRADE DEPENDENT UPON THE REPRODUCTION 
OF EUROPEAN ENTERPRISE 

With my return to Panama in April, 1891, where I 
received a warm welcome from Mr. Adamson, the 
United States Consul-General, and many other friends 
whom I had met during the previous year, my journeys 
in Tropical America came to an end. The circuit 
which I had been making was that of the vast empire 
won by the maritime genius of mediaeval Spain, liber- 
ated by virtues smacking of the soil of the New World, 
and converted during the last fifty years into a com- 
mercial dependency of Europe. A hundred years ago, 
the Southern countries were inspired with a love of 
liberty and independence, when the American Colonies 
rose in revolt against England. The work of Washing- 
ton in the North was taken up by Bolivar in Venezuela 
and New Granada, by Hidalgo and Morelos in Mexico, 
and by San Martin in the far South. Americans strongly 
sympathized with the Spanish Republics in their pro- 
tracted struggle against foreign domination. When 
the victory was won everywhere except in Cuba and 
390 



OUR CONTINENT 391 

Porto Rico, Spanish America was left to work out its 
destiny unaided and neglected by the Northern Repub- . 
lie whose institutions it had copied. For fifty years 
maritime Europe has been trading systematically with 
these Southern countries, supplying immense masses of 
capital for the development of their resources, employ- 
ing a well-equipped commercial marine, and funding 
and refunding their national and railway debts. A 
commercial empire lost in the Northern hemisphere at 
Yorktown has been regained by England under the 
Southern Cross, and Americans preoccupied with the 
development of their own industrial resources have 
been content to have it so. Whoever visits Tropical 
America will find much to criticise in the operation of 
republican institutions, and much, withal, to admire in 
the civic and material progress of races of mixed blood. 
If he be an American he will be constrained to lament 
his own country's neglect of commercial opportunities 
and political responsibilities in contributing to the 
world's work of civilization. 

Maritime Europe has taken possession of the import 
markets of these Southern countries, and converted them 
into commercial dependencies, while Americans have 
been juggling with a phrase. That is a rough way of 
stating the case. England, Germany, and France have 
opened rapid steamship communications with Brazil, 
the Plate countries, the West Coast and the Isthmus, 
and secured the general introduction of their manu- 
factures by the establishment of mercantile houses in 
the chief centres of population. They have assiduously 
cultivated trade relations with that portion of the world, 
deliberately studied the requirements of the climate and 
the tastes and habits of the people, and supplied the 



392 TKOPICAL AMERICA 

capital required for the construction of railways and 
the development of mineral and agricultural resources. 
From Guatemala to Patagonia the weight of English 
money and the force of German mercantile energy 
have been felt. The tremendous expansion of European 
commerce during the last thirty years, and the enormous 
investments of English and French capital in the mines 
and public works of that vast region, are facts easily 
understood by nations without financial resources of 
their own, and in need of a progressive policy of inter- 
nal improvement. Tropical America has been largely 
Europeanized while the English-speaking race of the 
Northern Republic has been allowing its commercial 
marine to disappear from the seas, and its statesmen to 
conjure aimlessly with the high-sounding phrases of the 
Monroe Doctrine. 

Dread of European colonization and encroachment 
has passed away, except in Venezuela ; and each nation 
is confident of its own ability to repel foreign invasion 
without assistance or moral support from the Northern 
Republic. It never enters into the Spanish-American's 
mind that the diplomacy of Washington has been help- 
ful to him during the present century. He attributes 
the political emancipation of his country to his own 
civic virtues, and its material development to his own 
energy aided by European investments. The Monroe 
Doctrine as a proclamation of the homogeneity of all 
interests affecting the American Continent is wholly 
unintelligible to him. 

This confusion of mind respecting what is often 
described as the chief canon of American diplomacy 
ought not to excite surprise in view of the historical 
evidence of the uncertainty and vacillation with which 



OUB CONTINENT 393 

the Monroe Doctrine has been carried into practice. As 
soon as it was proclaimed the Spanish-American States 
endeavored to make use of it by inviting the United 
States to send delegates to an amphictyonic council to 
be held at Panama. The scheme appealed at once to 
the imagination of Mr. Clay, who was then Secretary of 
State, and had been an enthusiastic champion of the 
liberties of the races rising in revolt against Spain. 
The Administration of the second Adams warmly 
approved of the project, aiid nominated a Commission to 
represent the United States in an assembly of Spanish- 
American States, which were apparently anxious to place 
themselves under the leadership of the Northern Repub- 
lic, as well as to take common counsel for promoting 
mutual security and independence. President Adams, 
while enumerating in a special Message the advantages 
to be derived from the united action of republican 
States, and from the establishment of liberal principles 
of commercial intercourse, maritime neutrality, and 
religious toleration, announced that the Panama Con- 
gress would probably adopt the Monroe Doctrine as an 
agreement that each country must guard its own terri- 
tory from European encroachment. This interpretation 
of the Monroe Doctrine by its real author seemed to 
forestall the idea that the United States intended to 
extend its protection to Spanish-American countries 
menaced with European invasion. It was a plain inti- 
mation that each country was to defend its own ter- 
ritories by resources at its command. The special 
Message excited acrimonious debate in the United 
States Senate, and the Commission was not authorized 
without strenuous resistance and protracted delay. The 
International Conference was gradually narrowed at 



394 TROPICAL AMERICA 

Washington into a benevolent scheme for giving good 
advice to the Spanish countries on various safe subjects. 
The original purpose of forming a league for common 
defence and for the liberation of Cuba was abandoned. 
The American commissioners arrived at Panama after 
the adjournment of the Congress, which in the absence 
of encouragement from the United States proved a 
failure. 

This was the first attempt to test the practical efficacy 
of the Monroe Doctrine, and the results did not impress 
Spanish America favorably. As time went on, the 
principle was revived only to be compromised in con- 
nection with projects for the construction of an inter- 
oceanic water-way across Central America. In the 
Clayton-Bulwer treaty, the withdrawal of all English 
claims to sovereignty over the coasts of Nicaragua and 
Honduras was nominally secured by the United States. 
In return for a series of promises which have not been 
fulfilled to this day, either in Belize, or in the Mosquito 
Reservation, Great Britain was admitted in 1850, to an 
equal share in the protectorate of any interoceanic 
canal, which might be constructed. There was nothing 
in that tangled skein of baffled and inexplicable Ameri- 
can diplomacy to inspire Spanish America with respect 
for the Monroe Doctrine. The Convention with Colom- 
bia, for securing American protection of the Panama 
Railway, was more intelligible; but when the French 
Canal was projected, a generation afterward, it seemed 
to be impracticable for the United States to embody in 
its diplomatic policy a definite basis of action. Equally 
inefficient were the protests of the Washington Gov- 
ernment against the invasion of Venezuelan territory 
by the English colonists of Guiana. The French evac- 



OUR CONTINENT 396 

uation of Mexico, and the control of the railway at the 
Isthmus, were the chief results of fifty years of diplo- 
matic exposition of the Monroe Doctrine. The effect 
of these achievements was largely counteracted by fail- 
ures elsewhere, and particularly in Central America. 

The memories of the Panama Congress were revived on 
October 2, 1889, when the Pan-American Congress met 
in Washington to discuss measures tending to promote 
the peace and prosperity of all republican nations on 
the American continent. This meeting was held in 
response to invitations which the American Congress 
had authorized the government to issue. The sessions 
were prolonged for twenty weeks, during which reports 
were received on commercial union, international arbi- 
tration, steamship communications, railways, banking 
facilities, coinage, weights, measures, patents, and trade- 
marks. As the Pan-American Congress was not armed 
with treaty-making powers, its recommendations had no 
binding force ; but the moral effect of promoting an 
amicable exchange of thought, and neighborly good- 
will, was produced. The most important results of the 
meeting were the recommendations respecting partial 
treaties of reciprocity, the adoption by representatives 
of all the powers except Chili, of a resolution in favor 
of compulsory arbitration, as an expedient for prevent- 
ing war, and the authorization of preliminary surveys 
for a system of railways to connect the Three Americas. 

The majority report of the Committee on Customs 
Union condemned as impracticable, or at least as pre- 
mature, an unrestricted exchange of products between 
the American nations ; but advised the negotiation of 
partial schemes of reciprocity, based upon equivalent 
advantages. The United States promptly acted upon 



396 TBOPICAL AMERICA 

these recommendations, and is now carrying out a 
policy which received in advance the approval of the 
representatives of all the powers except Chili, the Ar- 
gentine Republic, and Paraguay. In order to convert 
reciprocity into a lever for opening Southern markets, 
it was only necessary to bring it to bear upon Brazil, 
and the Spanish West Indies, from which the United 
States was drawing its main supplies of coffee and sugar. 
If it had been impracticable to negotiate any commercial 
conventions, all the States and European dependencies 
would have remained on equal terms when the privileges 
of a free market were withdrawn. As soon as Brazil 
and Spain were drawn into diplomatic engagements, a 
basis for future discrimination in their favor was secured. 
The United States Government was highly favored by 
circumstances in making the earliest conventions. Bra- 
zil was readily brought into a commercial alliance after 
the Revolution. The youngest Republic was grateful 
to the United States. It strongly supported the Pan- 
American policy at Washington, promptly accepted the 
principle of compulsory arbitration, and as soon as it 
was approached on the subject of commercial union, 
made a treaty highly favorable to the United States. 
This convention, which was grounded upon a permanent 
free market for coffee, became a base for diplomatic 
action with Venezuela, Mexico, and Central America, 
whose chief product would be exposed to a discrimi- 
nating duty in the United States, after January 1, 1892, 
if they neglected to comply with the requirements of 
equitable trade. 

The Spanish Convention furnished a similar base for 
opening the sugar-producing countries to American 
exports. It was followed almost immediately by a 



OUR CONTINENT 397 

convention with San Domingo. The United States 
Government was aided in its diplomacy in that quarter 
by the rivalries existing between the black republics. 
When Hayti, whose trade was largely controlled by 
France, rejected the proposals for the lease of a coaling- 
station, and displayed indifference to commercial rela- 
tions with the United States, the less prosperous rival, 
on the other side of the island, solicited reciprocity, and 
obtained it, on more favorable terms than either Brazil 
or the Spanish West Indies had done. By arrange- 
ments, subsequently made with Germany, concessions 
were obtained for American agricultural products, in 
return for the free market for beet sugar. Toward the 
close of 1891 Commissioners from British Guiana, Ja- 
maica, Trinidad, Barbadoes, and the Windward and 
Leeward groups of the British West Indies, succeeded 
in securing the same market by agreeing to reduce the 
import duties upon American flour and other products. 
Hawaii being already included in the reciprocity ar- 
rangements, the resources of the free market for sugar 
were practically exhausted when, on the basis of the 
importations of 1890, conventions were made with Bra- 
zil, the Spanish West Indies, San Domingo, Germany, 
and the British West Indies, from which 86.15 per cent 
of the foreign supply of the United States was obtained. 
Reciprocity conventions with Brazil, Salvador, Costa 
Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and the West 
Indies provided fair exchange for the bulk of the coffee 
importations. 

Reciprocity is the first practical attempt to substitute 
for the vague phrases of the Monroe Doctrine, a basis of 
economic union between the various nations of the 
American Continent. It involves an equalization of 



398 TROPICAL AMERICA 

commercial relations by the reduction of revenue duties 
on each side. The free market provided in the United 
States for Southern produce has cheapened staples of 
food by the removal of revenue duties. In the same 
way the import duties levied upon flour and provisions 
in Brazil, Spanish America, and the West Indies have 
been large sources of revenue. When these are reduced, 
or taken off altogether, as the result of reciprocity, the 
imported food supplies of impoverished populations are 
cheapened. Here is an economic principle of inestima- 
ble benefit to all the countries brought into commercial 
union. What has determined the negotiation of the 
treaties, and the success of the policy, is the weight of 
the American market. The total imports in 1890 from 
South America, the West Indies, Central America, and 
Mexico into the United States amounted to $198,940,575. 
The fact that the bulk of the produce of the Southern 
countries now finds not only its best, but an essentially 
free market in the United States, has been brought to 
bear upon the problem of equalizing exchanges. Europe 
has invested not less than $1,500,000,000, during the 
last thirty years, in railways, mines, and national secu- 
rities in Brazil, the Argentine, Chili, Peru, and other 
South American States. That enormous mass of capital 
has exerted an attractive force in promoting general 
trade with Europe. The requirements of a nation of 
63,000,000 of consumers, on the other hand, have created 
a great market for tropical produce in the United States. 
The weight of that market is to be felt hereafter as a 
determining force in regulating commercial exchanges. 
Another recommendation of the Pan-American Con- 
gress has been carried into effect by the organization 
of an international commission for making prelimi- 



OUB CONTINENT 399 

nary surveys for a continuous line of railway uniting 
the two hemispheres. On the Isthmus this project 
is regarded as chimerical. This is natural, for 
Colon and Panama owe their existence to the transit 
trade between the two oceans. Transportation on 
North and South lines is considered as visionary as 
rapid transit to the moon. All the traditions of the 
Isthmus from the days when Columbus coasted from 
the Gulf of Honduras to the Bay of Limon in search 
of a passage to the East Indies are arrayed against it. 
Panama is separated by long reaches of trackless wilder- 
ness from the Magdalena valley on one side and on the 
other from the fruitful plateau of San Jos^ in Costa 
Rica. It lacks the imagination required for anticipat- 
ing the construction of a railway from Southern Mexico 
to Bogotd. When enthusiasts assure them that only 
5000 miles of roadbed will have to be graded and 
put in operation in order to establish railway service 
between New York and Buenos Ayres, residents of 
Panama politely intimate that adequate facilities for 
humane treatment of the insane are lacking on the 
Isthmus. " Take your map of the world," one of the 
most influential Americans on the Isthmus said to me, 
" and you will see that the main railway systems follow 
the parallels rather than the meridians. Read the his- 
tory of commerce, and you will learn that the lines of 
trade have always run east and west, never north and 
south. The law of the planet on its axis is the law of 
modern progress. The winds of heaven were designed 
to blow the whitening sails of commerce through an 
interoceanic canal. It is easier and more natural to 
marry two oceans than two continents." 

As I listened to these generalizations I recalled a 



400 TROPICAL AMERICA 

bright morning in Buenos Ayres when two railway en- 
thusiasts took my maps and demonstrated to their own 
satisfaction the facility with which the United States 
could be brought into railway communication with the 
Plate. One of my visitors was ex-Minister Osborne, 
who had secured from the Government of Paraguay 
concessions for the construction of two lines of railway 
above Asuncion across the Chaco to the Bolivian border. 
The other was Russell R.. Peeler, who had given em- 
phatic testimony before the United States commission- 
ers in favor of a continental trunk railway as a means 
of reviving American trade. They did not believe that 
competition- with European maritime powers was practi- 
cable on the sea, but considered the establishment of a 
trunk railway, which could be tapped by various coun- 
tries, as the only possible expedient for the restoration of 
American commercial ascendency in the Southern hemi- 
sphere. Mr. Peeler's face lighted up with a fine glow of 
enthusiasm as he worked out on paper the details of the 
Three Americas Railway. On another occasion an Ameri- 
can Minister over a bottle of champagne traced for me 
an alternative route through Brazil to Maranhao as a ter- 
minal point, and still another American diplomatist in- 
dicated Puerto Cabello in Venezuela as the Caribbean 
base of a railway system to be constructed under a guar- 
antee of interest payments from Washington. 

With these exceptions all sober-minded Americans 
whom I met in my journeys ridiculed these railway 
projects as vagaries of speculators and dreamers of the 
Sellers type. Mr. Thorndike, in Lima, who had been 
an active railway manager and owner for many years, 
told me that he had no faith in the Three Americas line, 
and expressed surprise that it should be seriously con- 



I 



OUR CONTINENT 401 

sidered in the United States. The distances, in his 
judgment, were so great that if the continental railway 
were built, freight could not be carried in competition 
with steamers. Consul-General Adamson in Panama 
frankly confessed that he lacked the patience required 
for discussing so chimerical a scheme as a continental 
railway. My own- observations were in accord with 
these conclusions with the single exception that the ex- 
tension of the Mexican system to Costa Rica seemed to 
me entirely feasible. In Buenos Ayres I was told that 
the greater part of the work had already been provided 
for by the Southern Republics, and that an American 
corporation would not have to construct more than 
1,500 miles of railway; but I have failed to find in my 
journeys any important link in the continental system. 
In Colombia there are only a few short railways. In 
Ecuador there may be a line some day between Quito 
and Guayaquil, but it will be hundreds of miles to the 
west of any practicable trunk route. In Peru there is 
a series of lateral railways, but no line which would be 
a link in the chain running north and south. The 
Chilians have carried a railway from Antofagasta into 
Bolivia, but that would be only a feeder for a conti- 
nental line. Buenos Ayres and Valparaiso will be 
brought into railway communication within three years 
by the tunnelling of the Cumbre in Uspallata, but that 
system follows the parallels rather than the meridians. 
The narrow gauge line from Cordova to the Bolivian 
frontier could not be connected with the proposed trunk 
railway. The coffee railways of Brazil lie outside the 
range of the continental scheme. 

Certainly the distances are appalling even to one 
who has not been trained to believe that the Isthmus 



402 TROPICAL AMERICA 

was designed by nature to facilitate trade from ocean 
to ocean. From New York to Buenos Ayres by the 
most practical route yet proposed there would be a 
railway mileage of over 8100. From the southern 
terminus of the Mexican system to New York there 
is now railway communication for a distance of 3200 
miles. About 5000 miles of railway will be required 
in order to connect Buenos Ayres with New York and 
Chicago. Not only are all the links missing, but the 
sections through which the projectors hope to carry the 
line are either inhabited by Indians or are forests with- 
out population. The necessity of avoiding, on one side, 
the Cordilleras, and, on the other, rivers which cannot be 
bridged, diverts the proposed line from the populated 
seaboard to unexplored and uninhabited regions like 
the Chaco and the Peruvian Montana. In order to 
convert such a railway into a remunerative enterprise, 
it would be necessary to open vast tracts to immigra- 
tion, and to empty the surplus population of Europe 
into them. When the country was once populated, and 
industries established in what is now a wilderness with 
huddles of Indian huts, the movement of freight would 
be toward the coast by the lateral lines, rather than 
northward to the United States. A merchant marine 
equal in efficiency to that of maritime Europe would 
be indispensable for the development of American trade, 
even if the continental railway project were carried 
out. The distances would be so great that tropical 
produce could not be supplied to the northern market 
by rail in competition with steamship freights. 

An interoceanic canal would be as inefficient an ex- 
pedient as a continental railway for the development 
of American trade unless it were supplemented by 



OUB CONTINENT 403 

maritime and mercantile energy. The Panama Canal, 
if completed, will bring the west coast of South Amer- 
ica into direct water communication with New York; 
but unless there are American steamship lines on that 
coast, and American wholesale houses for the introduc- 
tion of manufactures, the waterway cannot directly 
promote trade. When either the Panama or the Nica- 
ragua Canal is advocated as a necessity for the enlarge- 
ment of American trade with the West Coast, Central 
America, China, Japan, and Australia, the fact is over- 
looked that with San Francisco as a base there is 
already direct water communication with all these coun- 
tries. What has been lacking has been American 
energy in opening these foreign markets. With Cali- 
fornia producing everything required for two thousand 
miles of rainless coast in South America, there has 
been no organized attempt to compete with the English 
and Chilians in the carrying trade. Australia and 
China have not been converted into foreign markets by 
maritime energy and mercantile enterprise. The water- 
way may be constructed, but unless there is a change 
of American policy, it will be used mainly by European 
shipping in carrying English and German manufactures 
to foreign markets, where American competition is not 
conducted with intelligence and success. 

A direct proof of this statement is to be found in 
the effect of the construction of the Panama Railway. 
That was an American enterprise undertaken in the 
interest of American trade ; but it has benefited Euro- 
pean manufactures to a large extent. The control of 
the transit trade, now averaging $50,000,000 a year, by 
an American corporation, has not retarded the devel- 
opment of English and German trade with the West 



404 TROPICAL AMERICA 

Coast. American trade was not promoted by that 
enterprise at the expense of foreign interests. The 
control of six-sevenths of the shares of the railway- 
passed into the hands of the French Canal Company 
without having any appreciable effect upon foreign 
trade. Whether the canal be French, English, or 
American, the markets opened by more direct water 
communication will be controlled by that nation whose 
merchants and steamship lines vigorously and success- 
fully compete for them. 

An interoceanic canal, either at Panama or at Nica- 
ragua, will have the important effect of bringing the 
Atlantic and Pacific seaboards into closer relations for 
purposes of military and naval defence. On this ground 
an American policy is needed respecting the Canals. 
The United States can anticipate the completion of 
either waterway with European capital by taking hold 
either of one or of the other as a government work and 
controlling it as such for military purposes, while open- 
ing it to the commerce of the world. This would be 
a practical application of the Monroe Doctrine, and it 
would be understood both in Europe and throughout 
Spanish America. The generalizations which have ap- 
peared in Presidential messages and Congressional reso- 
lutions during the last twenty years may have been 
rhetorical and patriotic, but they have not furnished a 
basis for a definite canal policy. What is needed is 
action by which one canal or the other may be built 
without engineering mismanagement, and speculative 
recklessness, shorter lines of ocean transportation opened, 
and the control of the waterway resolutely asserted and 
maintained. Such a work might cost $100,000,000 or 
even $200,000,000; but it would be an investment 



OUR CONTIlSrENT ' 405 

under American control, and not like the $1,000,000,000 
which Europe flung into the whirlpool of Argentine 
speculation. 

Whether the continental railway be built, or an inter- 
oceanic waterway opened, or a complete series of reci- 
procity treaties negotiated, the permanent development 
of American trade with the Southern Republics requires 
the reproduction of European mercantile and maritime 
enterprise. These policies, singly or collectively, must 
be supplemented by the multiplication of steamship lines 
and the establishment of wholesale houses in all the 
important centres of Southern trade. While reciproc- 
ity will be a substantial gain to consumers North and 
South, and will tend to increase the exchanges of the 
food products of essentially different zones, its efficiency 
as a lever for opening foreign markets for manufac- 
tures of cotton, rubber, leather, iron, steel, glass, and 
paper, will probably be less than is generally supposed. 
This is a conclusion which I have formed after talking 
with merchants in all portions of Tropical America, and 
observing the lack of intelligence and enterprise dis- 
played by Northern manufacturers. Reciprocity offers 
large opportunities for an expansion of American com- 
merce and influence ; but full advantage cannot be taken 
of an enlightened policy so long as mercantile energy is 
confined to the home market, and the Southern Hemi- 
sphere is neglected and surrendered to European com- 
petitors. American manufacturers have not known 
what was wanted in tropical countries. American mer- 
chants have not learned how to ship, pack, and sell 
goods for the Southern market. Ignorance of the com- 
mercial requirements and social conditions of the Span- 
ish Republics has been, and still remains, the chief 



406 TROPICAL AMERICA 

obstacle to the enlargement of American trade. Unless 
this difficulty can be overcome, differential advantages 
of twenty-five or fifty per cent secured by treaty in 
cottons and hardware will be of little avail. 

At Par4 I found an American wholesale house and 
one also in Pernambuco ; but hardly another one on the 
Atlantic seaboard south of the Amazon until I reached 
Montevideo. On the West Coast there were several 
mercantile houses dealing largely but not exclusively 
in American goods. In Venezuela, Cuba, and British 
West Indies and Mexico there are Americans on the 
ground, and the effect of their presence and intelligent 
supervision of the details of business is disclosed by a 
substantial increase in the sale of manufactures from 
the United States. In the Brazilian coast towns, in the 
Plate countries, on the West Coast, in Central America, 
Mexico, and the West Indies, English, French, and 
German merchants are found in wholesale houses. They 
are conversant with all the details of customs law, in- 
terior transportation, invoicing of goods, and the pecu- 
liarities of public taste. They carry large stocks from 
which retail dealers can replenish their chelves when- 
ever they choose to order goods, and there is no delay 
in filling orders, and there are no costly blunders in 
packing and invoicing by which duties are unnecessarily 
increased. This is the method adopted b}^ mercantile 
Europe in introducing its manufactures. American 
manufacturers, meanwhile, have been seeking to com- 
pete with them by soliciting the aid of consuls in 
peddling their wares, and by sending over the ground 
commercial travellers unfamiliar with the native lan- 
guage, and unprepared to tell retail dealers what im- 
portations from the United States would cost when 



OUR CONTINENT 407 

placed on their counters or when they could get them. 
The establishment of wholesale houses in all the impor- 
tant centres of population of the West Indies, Mexico, 
Central America, and South America would be of greater 
practical value in promoting the introduction of Ameri- 
can manufactures- than all the reciprocity conventions 
which have been negotiated. 

Maritime energy, by which a new commercial marine 
can be brought into existence under the national flag, is 
also needed in order that full advantage may be derived 
from favorable commercial conventions. There are now 
six American steamship lines participating in the carry- 
ing trade of the Southern countries, a feeble remnant of 
a merchant fleet which was once the pride and glory of 
a maritime nation. Only one of these crosses the equa- 
tor, calling at St. Thomas, Martinique, and Barbadoes 
before making the circuit of the Brazilian coast. The 
exports of the Southern countries, amounting, in 1890, 
to nearly $200,000,000, were largely brought into Ameri- 
can ports by foreign ships, many of which returned to 
the tropics by way of Europe, thereby depriving mer- 
chants and manufacturers of the advantage of direct 
trade in exchange. I talked with Americans in all the 
countries which I visited, and ascertained that there 
was no divergence of opinion among them on this sub- 
ject. They all attributed the commercial ascendancy of 
maritime Europe very largely to the intelligence and 
energy with which steam communication had been 
opened with Tropical America. When commerce is 
undertaken with nations which have no merchant fleets 
of their own, the flag advertises foreign enterprise. The 
absence of the American flag, in ports crowded with 
European shipping, is accepted as an unerring indica- 



408 TROPICAL AMERICA 

tion of lack of energy. When the United States ceases 
to be the only nation which deliberately neglects its 
shipping interests, large results may be confidently 
anticipated from the reciprocit}^ policy, but not other- 
wise. Wherever Americans have made an earnest effort 
to compete with foreigners, as in Cuba, Venezuela, and 
Mexico, they have been successful. With mercantile 
energy and ample steamship, mail, and banking facilities, 
they will not fail in any quarter of Ti-opical America. 
Preoccupied with the development of their own coun- 
try, they have neglected a great field, where there is a 
foreign trade of over $1,200,000,000 a year. It is a 
commerce worth competing for with all the resources of 
American energy. 

The moral effect of intimate trade relations, between 
the United States and the Southern Eepublics, will be 
very great. Countries which have been powerfully 
influenced by nations dominated by monarchical ideas 
have much to learn from the Northern Republic, whose 
political institutions they have imperfectly assimilated. 
Whoever visits Tropical America has to make allowance 
for cycles of retarded development before he can be 
adequately impressed with the fact that the Latin race, 
while it has a different strain from Anglo-Saxon blood, 
is performing useful functions in the economy of civili- 
zation. The Southern half of the continent bears at 
once the impress of the vices and the virtues of Spanish 
and Portuguese conquest. The vices are military su- 
premacy, irresponsible power and official corruption, and 
contact with Europe, where a spirit of militarism pre- 
vails, and where bond-holding syndicates are reaching 
after the hisfhest rates of interest to be obtained from 
impoverished nations, has enlarged and aggravated 



OUR CONTINENT 409 

them. The virtues are sturdy independence, a genuine 
love of liberty, flexibility in dealing with mixed races, 
and faith in the superior resources of the New World. 
These virtues would have been promoted by closer 
commercial intercourse with the United States. The 
Argentine, as a commercial dependency of Europe, has 
been ruled by political cabals, debauched by foreign 
money-lenders, and plundered by speculative adventur- 
ers. Mexico, under the influence of American capital 
and railway construction, has a strong and enlight- 
ened national government, and a well-ordered system of 
finance. The United States can do more than Europe, 
in Tropical America, toward organizing and directing 
the moral force of public opinion, upon which the suc- 
cess and practical efficiency of genuine republican in- 
stitutions depend. It only needs to be brought into 
constant commercial intercourse with all the Southern 
countries in order to accomplish a great work for civili- 
zation. 



Typography by J. S. Gushing & Co., Boston, U.S.A. 
Presswork by Berwick & Smith, Boston, U.S.A. 



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